Our Lives Adventures: January 2013

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Settling In!

Yah! the CPM is here! and he is early :)

woo hoo!

She was relieved to be moving and not by me :)

Danny was fascinated by the whole thing and wanted to sit with her to do homework!

Playing Barbie's :)

She has done so well, her left leg is twice the size of her right one. It is starting to bruise up pretty good.
She got up too fast today and got dizzy and turned white. Scared the heck out of her and Dan. But luckily some crackers and juice and laying down on our bed made her feel much better. she is on the CPM about 20-22 hours per day and seems to settle in pretty good.
I am sure by next week she will be pretty bored!

Sunday, January 13, 2013

Home !!

So happy to be home!!! It was the fastest trip home ever! 5 hours!

She did amazing!
Don't even ask about the medical supply company that was supposed to deliver her CPM tonight and said they were busy, did not know why I was told they would be there and someone would be over tomorrow sometime. Good thing I wrote down names! I will be ripping a new one if someone is not here first thing in the morning!!
The kids are all asleep and Gerri has a pillow rolled up and ace bandaged under her knee.
So happy to be home!
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Going home!

Let's get this party started!

I can do it!

Woo hoo!

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Saturday, January 12, 2013

Gerri is doing great! hope to go home tomorrow :)

Getting PT again, Ryan really made her work for it!
He showed me a bunch of exercises to start on.
Her leg is not as swollen and hard. I washed her hair and brushed her teeth first thing and she was very happy :)

Lost a baby molar! she is now missing 3 teeth on that side!

chillin out, clean hair, pigtails, feeling good!

The resident came in and said all looks good. Gerri's epidural will be turned off first thing in the am (around 5 am) then taken out around 7 am. They will start her on oral pain meds. PT will get her up on her feet. IF all goes well we will be discharged and on the road by lunch!
So not only did Gerri lose a tooth, do great with PT, we had poop!!! :) this is very big! :)
She was feeling much better :)
I am praying they are able to keep her pain under control and our trip home goes quickly!

Friday, January 11, 2013

Gerri is doing great!!

Thursday am at 7:30 we were at the Shriners for surgery

Waiting to be taken down to Surgery - doing my XtraMath homework :)

time to go yet?!?!?!

Versed is on board :) waiting to go back to the OR

Surgery was 3 hours long and dr vB says she did great! He took her hip hardware out! did lots of scar tissue and releases and a tenotomy. She had scar tissue all along her left hip/thigh/knee from surgeries and the fixator and he released it all. Her left leg is swollen and about twice the size of her right leg :(

First view of her in the PICU, smiling :)

she is so happy she has a short leg cast!

this is SO amazing! 90 degree bend in the knee and hip!!!!

She slept most of Thursday on and off and the epidural kept the pain away :)

Friday am and still smiling :)

then PT came in! she was SO scared of being touched :(
they could not get her to bend more than 70 degrees in the am, by afternoon they were able to get it to 80 degrees

chillin out after eating dinner and talking to her dad and siblings

dr vB is leaving the epidural in for a few days so we can keep her moving without any pain. The only thing she has complained about is the tenotomy (snipping of her achilles tendon) and the dr said that would probably be the worst part. I think the epidural will stay in till tomorrow afternoon or so, then get pulled so the nurses have time to see if they can manage her pain with oral meds so we can be discharged on Sunday!
she is currently on the CPM machine 24/7, we do NOT want to lose any of her range of motion. Will find out more tomorrow am when the dr comes in. I think she is bored :)
thanks for all the prayers, she has done amazingly!!

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

Surgery tomorrow!

Gerri and I have been in Philly since last Friday.

She was re-casted Friday and Monday in preparation for surgery tomorrow.

she will get her hip hardware taken out and have muscle and scar tissue releases done on her hip and knee.

We are hoping to get back the ROM lost with her hip surgery and fixator.

We have had SO much fun while here :)

We did Disney on Ice, RMH had their 5th birthday.

We had the fastest recast appt ever! (30 minutes!)

We got to meet Alexandra :)

got to do lots of coloring

visited with the Rieben clan!

the kids got to make cupcakes for Josh's birthday :)

Sophie and Evan said good bye!

Gerri and her BFF Sophie having fun

Coloring again :)

Lots of hugs!!

I finally told Gerri Monday that we were staying all week because she was having surgery. She thought about it and didn't ask again. then today it hit her and she woke up with a tummy ache. We went with Sophie to have her fixator removed and it helped her focus on Sophie today. Every once in a while she would get really quiet and I would find something else for her to do. We talked about how cool it was that Sophie was having her metal taken out today and Gerri is having her metal taken out tomorrow, so for the first time in 3 years Gerri will have no metal in her body!!

Pray tomorrow goes as planned! with muscle and scar tissue releases she will be on an epidural and a continuous motion machine. We hope to be discharged Sat or Sun and on our way home!

will update tomorrow :)