The Cast

Before I get to the latest Jacob update, please allow me to share this picture of Carter with a fresh haircut!  We'd let his hair get a little out of control.  I mean, he looked completely acceptable, but it was shaggy!  I meant to get it done last weekend, but my cold got in the way of that so we finally got it done early this week.  He sat all by himself in the chair and was such a good listener!  He looks so handsome...and so grown up!

Now...as for Jacob...Yesterday was his follow-up appointment with the surgeon.  It was in the nick of time, as his post-surgery splint was starting to fall apart.  It was still intact, but the ace bandage was coming undone so it was definitely time for something a little more secure.

The first order of business was to get the splint off.  The nurse cut off the ace bandage and then slowly picked her way through the cotton wrapping.  Jacob seemed okay during that process, but then it came time to pull the rest of the splint apart and lift his foot off of the remaining material.  That was when the trouble started.  Jacob screamed in pain.  Even after the initial lift, he continued to yell and whine in pain.  It was hard to tell why it was hurting.  Maybe the motion hurt, but it could also be that it felt funny after a couple weeks of immobility, he didn't have any other way to describe the odd feeling other than pain.  I think he was also a little nervous about seeing the scar, too.  I'll admit, the scar was pretty impressive.  It's probably about three inches long.  It's healing up pretty well, but it's going to be a doozy for a while. 

In any event, he carried on for the entire time we waited to see the surgeon, and then again before we went into the casting room.  He also had to pee at the time, which I'm sure didn't help his state of mind.  He attempted to stop in the bathroom on the way to the casting room, but that was a no-go, probably because his leg was just sort of hanging there without support. 

He was still freaking out by the time he got into the casting room.  The guy doing the cast tried to talk to him, but it wasn't really helping.  He did the base layer of the cast with some cotton, then covered it with a sock.  At that point, with Jacob still pretty upset, the cast maker suggested they take a break.  He tried talking to Jacob again, this time asking about his Blue Jays hat.  Like magic, Jacob started to calm down.  Slowly but surely he wrapped the cotton around, and eventually started in on the fiberglass part.  Jacob chose red as his color, and the finished product looked great!

He went back to school for the rest of the day, but opted to not get it signed by his friends that day.  He actually told me that he didn't want anyone to sign it because he didn't want them to make it messy.  However, today he came home with signatures, so apparently he decided messy was more fun!

Here are some pictures, pre-signing:

He can still play on the Wii!

Side view

Front view

For perspective...

He seems to be doing pretty well with it, but he's insisting it is loose.  The casting guy warned us that when there's swelling (he still had a little), the cast can loosen up a bit.  If that happens we have to go back and get a new one.  I doubt it loosened up that quickly, but maybe the guy didn't do it as tight as usual because Jacob was so upset?  Or maybe Jacob is just adjusting to how it should feel?  We'll see.  But at least it's good to have some extra protection for his renegade style on the crutches!

He'll be in the cast for a month, and then hopefully after that he can get back to regular, low-impact activities.  I think it'll still be a couple weeks after that before he can start running on it.  He's out of gym class for eight weeks, so it works out to a couple extra weeks after the cast before he can be back to normal.  And every day is one day closer to that!  We've heard his lacrosse team is getting better, which is promising, and I know he will be much happier when he can participate in gym and the afterschool activities again.  In the meantime, I know it's tough on him.  Spending his entire winter break at the afterschool program's full-day program might be very challenging for him, but hopefully the longer he's like this, the sooner he'll accept it and figure out a way to make this more tolerable for himself.  He's been pretty good so far, but he does have a few party pooper moments where he makes things harder for himself than he has to.  But I give him credit...I never thought he'd survive having to be this sedentary!

Three weeks and six days to go!