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Friday, October 21, 2011

Progress & next surgery

Sunshine continues to make slow but steady progress with her physical therapy. I do still feel like there are some days when I am a therapist all day long, but it's working. She is now pulling up on everything, including moving objects like the ride-on toys! She can't pull herself onto them yet, but I'm so impressed that she is pulling up on them - that means she trusts herself enough to balance on them. So cool! She has also started furniture cruising, finally! I never thought I'd be excited about that, but I am! I'm so thrilled to see even the smallest steps :-) She is crawling more too, but her favorite mode of transportation is still the butt scoot. LOL. I'm working on teaching her how to go down the steps on her belly but she seems to favor flying head first instead. Oh boy. It's interesting because she is so reserved in the rest of her life, but happy to plunge head first down the steps. Go figure.

We are 3 weeks out from her next surgery. Ugh. Honestly, I'm dreading it because I know what the recovery was like for the last one. I'll be doing a lot of prayer for patience and grace, I'm sure. This next one is a final, cosmetic lip repair. The surgeon will also do some nose work, although she will most likely need a nose revision around Kindergarten. And because this surgery is the cosmetic fix, the surgeon uses plastic surgery sutures, which do not dissolve and have to be removed under general anesthesia (again) 5 days after surgery. Thinking about that makes me want to cry. She will also have stents stitched into her nose to support the healing process ... they are removed at her one-MONTH follow up appointment while she is awake. That one actually makes me stomach a little woozy. I can usually handle a lot, but I think I might have to leave the room when they strap her into a papoose board for that. Everything is already *so* traumatic for her ... I'm afraid of how she'll handle it.

On the positive side though, she'll have a beautifully-repaired mouth and nose and all will be healed before Christmas. I'm trying to keep things in perspective, but it's so difficult to put your child through something like this! For all of the prayer warriors out there, I'll take all of the prayer I can get! For Sunshine AND for me. LOL.

8 comments:

  1. Oh sweet love - cruising around and pulling up! Beautiful, beautiful girl :-). Nicole, I will DEFINITELY be praying for Brooklyn. May the Lord watch over every single procedure and give you His grace during the recovery process. I can feel my own blood pressure rising thinking about these surgeries, and it gives me a glimpse of my Lily's near future as well. Big hugs!

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  2. Surgery again? Sweet baby girl. She is so lovely and wow her hair is getting long and thick!

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  3. I'll pray for you both, Nicole. {{hugs}}

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  4. Oh no. One MONTH of nose stents? Is that typical? Not looking forward to that. I'm praying that things go smoothly and the month goes by quickly.

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  5. Well you will be finished up sometime with the surgeries, it is temporary! We did 4 surgeries about every 6 months on our girl for limb deformites and she is pretty much finished up with them! So your time too will come!

    hugs
    Donna

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  6. You got it Nicole! Prayers for you BOTH! :-)

    She will do great!! I know it seems tough but she is a tough little girl (clearly!).

    LOVE the heart sweater btw!

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  7. That papoose board is awful, isn't it? But you and Brooklyn will get through it all. She's loved and supported and that will get you both through.

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  8. The Leggio family will lift Brooklyn up in prayer and your whole family. I pray God will give you peace while she is in surgery, for protection over Brooklyn while in surgery and recovery.

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