I think she is a magnet for colds, she get's them soo easily. I really have to work extra hard with her, about hand washing and sterillizing shopping carts and restaurant tables. I take that extra care with a grain of salt...nothing is easy for Kaity in her cast. It seem's as though everything hard for everyone else, is magnified for her. Colds can be debilitating in cast. Picture a hard plaster cast around your chest, while you can't breath, as it is with your cold. You already feel restrcited when you have cold. The feeling of being unable to breath, with a stuffy nose. The cast must feel like it's squeezing her tight and she can't get a good breath, bc of her cast and runny/stuffy nose. Breathing treatments are absolutely
essentail, when she get's a cold. Thank God for those life saving treatments, their the only thing that seems to really open up her airways.
When you restrict or wrap your chest while you have a cold, it's dangerous.
It can set up pneumonia rather quickly. If that were to happen to her, she would have to have the cast sawn off at a ER and take the risk that we're taking it off to soon. Which is obviously the worst for her scoli care. Taking the cast off to early could mean lost ground on her treatment. We could loose what correction we've gained so far. So I am on the war path with her cold, I WILL beat it!
We until the 23rd of November to get her 100% well again. It is acheivable.
I've really been thinking this morning, just how hard that cast is for her.
I don't think anyone "looking in" can fully understand just how hard it is.
Kaitlyn carries around approximately 1/4 of her body weight on a daily basis.
I atribute that fact, to the fact that she fully preferes crawling than walking right now. Even though she knows 100% how to walk on her own. I don't force walking on her, I don't know what it's like to walk with all that weight on my body!
She finds ways to carry around all that weight, and she's such a trooper.
But there are times throughout the day, that even crawling is strenuous for her.
She'll be crawling like lightning and then just lay her face down on the floor for a few and then get back up at it again. I'm so proud of her, for getting back up everytime she's falls. She has such a strength inside of her.
She get's rashes and sores on her skin sometimes as well, as a result of her cast. I use baby Aveeno everyday on her precious skin, and it normally does it's job well. I can't imagine what her skin feels like under the cast, the area's I can't lotion or see. We are hoping they will find no sores on her skin, maybe just a couple of leftovers...lol...when they take her 1st cast off. If she did have a bad cast sore uner there, we may have to wait longer to get a 2nd cast on, until it heals.
Which as I've said before, time is not her side, when the cast is off.
Then there's heat hazards, which thankfully are over for the most part.
I am so thankfully to the Lord, that Kaitlyn got to have her whole summer cast free.
She got to swim and play outside, without worrying about getting a cast west, and worrying about "melting" under the hot sun with a cast on.
But, even in our home sometimes, she'll just start sweating her little head off.
So we'll have to open windows or turn on the AC for a little while.
But, for the most part, I keep her in her diaper and no shirts while she's at home.
Our greatest hope, is that by next summer, she'll be out of cast's and we won't have to worry as much about the dreaded summer sun.
Sleeping, well that's a whole nother ball game. I don't think she can ever get away with uncomfy sleeping. Her first night home in her cast, she slept in her crib wonderfully. I know that is only because of the remaining anesthesiain her system. The next few days were terrible. She kept rolling over and hitting herself on the crib rails and getting her legs caught between the rails. She just did not have enough room to stretch in her crampt crib. So we made the choice to buy her, her first toddler bed. While David was taking her crib down, I nearly cried.
Scoliosis, was making my baby sleep in a toddler bed to early. Scoliosis, has taken a lot from us. She was only 14months old, and should still be in her crib.
But, as much as that sadden me, I had realize that her comfort was more important than that. So her first night was ok in her toddler bed, she woke up about 2 times and we had to rock her back to sleep.
We started out using a gate at her door, but she was using her new found body weight to topple the gate to the floor. So we've had to just shut her door, another thing I don't really like...but what can you do?
Now she sleeps ok, in her toddler bed, still waking however a time or two a night. David or I will have to console her back to comfort and sleep.
But, what goes on the most is..we'll go into her room in the morning to get her up and we'll find her asleep on her lil couch (knee's bent like she's praying at an alter) and she looks 100% comfy. That's what she does most mornings and it must be comfy for her. So we don't stop her from doing that. Anything to make our princess comfy, is all that matters. I know that when she has her week brake, she'll be able to sleep in any old postion she wants and it will feel devine to her.
The reality is, there are moments of casting that suck...plain and simple.
The alternative is worse by far, but it still sucks sometimes.
These are just some of the stuff Kaity deals with on a regular basis.
But, she's one of the strongest persons I know. Her strength amazes me daily.
If I could poses half of her strength, I know I could get through anything in this world.
I know this more of a vent post, and I will end it with a positve note.
MY KID ROCKS! I love her SO much!