Monday, April 19, 2010

Surgery pic's and update.

I am sorry it has taken me a few days to post.
Whitnee eneded up having Surgery on Friday the 16th on her feet.
Nate and I went in a little nervous because of what the Surgeon had explained to me what she planed on doing.
She said that they were going to make a small incision in the back of her ankle and cut the tendon and let it fly on both feet, and on the left foot she would make an incision on the arch of her foot and release the tendons there to help flatten out her foot.
I was NOT okay with the thought of the Achilles Tendon being cut and NOT reattached.
As we sat down with the surgeon on Friday morning she went into a lot more detail about the surgery  (which I wish she would have done a week earlier so I would not have stressed so much)
But she informed us that the tendon she would cut would not affect her foot as we had expected it to, and that there are 3 other muscles that help in doing the same thing so her foot would still function as it should. 
They just wanted to get her standing.

Here she is with Daddy before they took her back to surgery.
(versed in her system she was really loopy)

Here is the Anesthesiologist getting ready to take her back to surgery.

The Surgery took 2 hours and we were really excited to here that she extubated with out any problems right after surgery. GREAT NEWS!!!
BUT the Anesthesiologist had to pull her top two teeth (because they were loose) so there was no risk of her aspirating on them during surgery.

Here she is after Surgery, she looks so good
(even with missing teeth)

We were really releaved to hear that the Surgeons did not cut her Achilles Tendon, they eneded up reattaching it after all.  They did release the tendons in the arch of her foot and ended up cutting the tendon that helps you flex your toes due to the fact that it was so tight it was part of the problem.
(So basically she can't pick up things with her toes off the floor now, but she could not before so no big deal.)

The picture above shows her casts wrapped in co ban, After putting the casts on they cut them to help with swelling, She ended up having so much drainage that they ended taking the casts off and putting on another set before we got to go home on Saturday.






 After the Anesthetic finally wore off all she asked for was a wagon ride.
It took most of the day to finally get one up to the ICU. Due to our nurse having 2 kids to watch over so when she finally got in it she was really excited.
I love the smile on her face.

We now prepare to go back on the 28th of April where they will again take her into the OR, remove the casts, tighten the stitches on her foot, mold her feet for her AFO's and then recast them.
(they wanted her to be under the anesthetics for all of this and after watching them change the casting in the ICU on Saturday I am totally okay with that.)
Then I think we will finally be on a road to recovery after all of this.

Thanks for all your help and prayers, we truly are blessed with great friends and family.



4 comments:

Taci said...

Glad to see everything went well! I hope the next one goes good too! We'll be thinking and praying about her! Love you guys!

Becca said...

I am glad she extubated well. That is always a scary time for me and if they do it right after being under, it's better. I love the smiles with the wagon ride. Priceless.

Becca-Ellie's mom

The Five Reids said...

Anna it was good talking to ya today!! Your blog is adorable. What was the name of that blog u liked nesting?? something??

April said...

So glad things went well- it's always scary for these special kiddos to be intubated! Loved the pics! She is so cute!