Surgery has come and gone and just like that we have
survived another hospital visit. Zackary is silently, well snoring away loudly,
next to me as I type. So is Adam but that’s another story J Any parent with a
child who has gone through something extreme knows how exhausting it is, but
back to Zackary… We woke up earlier then the sun and walked across to the
street to Sinai Hospital and was checked in and in pre-op by 6:30am. Everything
was looking good, almost too good, and we even almost added a last minute addition
to the surgery, but decided to go with the original plan and schedule out future
surgeries soon. Those details will be figured out more on Thursday morning and
will clarify more things then.
Not 10 minutes after he had rolled him away the doctor came
out to talk with us and that was definitely a first! Shouldn’t he be back
there, doing surgery?! Just a thought. Well he had to come out to let us know
once he got a closer look things weren’t quite like the way he wanted them to
be. That’s tough news to hear when you’ve driven over 1900 miles and taken your
spring break and the last 2 months preparing for this surgery. He let us know
that the density of the bone was not strong enough for him to feel confident to
remove the rod completely without high risk of fracturing occurring or
requiring him to stay very inactive for an unknown amount of time and we all
know how well that goes with a kid. He says the bone is about 80-90% dense
compared to the right leg. This is his whole left leg, not just the spot where
the lengthening occurred last year. He says this is caused by first doing the
aggressive surgery last year but also just from years of not using that leg as
much as the right leg. We will discuss methods of strengthening the bone come
our appointment on Thursday as well. He let us know that instead of taking out the
rod and screws he will just be taking out the screws. What this does by leaving
the rod in is a second defense of stability for the femur. However, by removing
the screws it has changed the hardware from static to dynamic which means the
rod will be able to move around a little within the inside of the bone and
without the screws the bone will be the first thing to absorb movement, instead
of the hardware, so it can be used more to strengthen the bone.
With that said, the surgery came and went like I first
mentioned and Zackary was back in his own bed by 11am, Johnathan and Ivan (who
was visiting from NY) weren’t even awake yet! LOL He’s eaten and drank a little
but is already asking for Taco Bell so we know he’s back to himself! He’s also
walking on his own, a little slow but still with no assistance. The doctor also
let us know it was very important to schedule the appointment on Thursday
morning before we leave to go over the next procedures that could be coming up
for him as early as this summer. But on a crazy and positive note one thing we
did learn today was that Zackary is actually supposed to be almost 6 feet 4
inches tall, so with his adjustments he may ONLY be 6’-6’1”!! Thank goodness
for tall genes!
Until
next time (hopefully around Thursday),
Momma
Miller
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