Now and Later

Not too long ago, Helena, Rebecca and I drove home from an outing to Baylor and Helena started to wail.

“Mommy, I wish you had never let them put those casts on my legs. These aren’t my legs – I will never have my ‘normal’ legs again.”

I reminded her, as I had many times over the summer, “Helena, remember that right now you may not be happy, but later, you will be very glad that we straightened them.”

“No I won’t be happy – these aren’t even my legs. Just look at them- they aren’t even all the way straight! I wish you had never let them put those casts on my legs. I am so mad at you!”

At that time, Helena had only been out of her casts for 3 weeks, and was still adjusting to the new braces. One leg is still slightly bent – it will require some surgery if we want to completely straighten it. She doesn’t know this – but she can see it is bent with her eyes and has made sure to point it out. She also still had a pressure wound on one foot that was having trouble healing.

At that time, the longer the braces were off, the harder they were to put back on. Helena has to leave her braces on for most of the time (22 hours per day) so that her legs don’t regress back to their original contractures. Over time, her legs should adjust to the new norm and she should be able to sleep without the braces or splints.

She will most likely always need some sort of bracing. And our decisions on which procedures to participate in will always be based on what will provide her with the best quality of life.

Parenting Through Difficult Moments

Parenting is so often difficult. Many times, our decisions may not work out the way we’d hoped, and may even complicate matters. If, however, choices are made with the best interests of others at heart, the long term rewards could far outweigh any current struggle. Stuart and I have had to spend a lot of time contemplating what’s best for Helena, and a lot of time just praying for wisdom. Helena’s condition comes with a lot of decisions that have no absolute answers, so we often find ourselves mulling over decisions.

Just last week…

It has now been almost 10 weeks since her casts finally came off.

Her strength is building up and as she does more, she is building stamina. Her pressure wound is now just a scar on the back of her foot that she still shows me from time to time. There are times when she is very tired at the end of the school day- and she still will say “Mama, I wish you hadn’t of let them do that to my legs.” And then there are days like last Thursday.

I finished my school work up and was getting ready to leave. Helena decided to sneak out the door of my classroom as I spoke with a teacher outside my room and disappeared down the hallway.

“She is gone!” said another friend with a smile as I looked down the hall to spot her. As I went around the other side, I heard Helena. “Can’t catch me!”

She ran in her way down the hall and hooked a right turn. I actually had to chase her out of the school to catch her. Once I got her back into the school, she caught a second wind and decided to try it again!

Her escape stunt made me so mad! And yet, it is amazing how far we have come since the beginning of June when we had wedge heeled braces and no ability to “run” at all.