So long, farewell

In a few short hours we'll get to say goodbye to our way of life the last five weeks...

• Goodbye blue fiberglass spica cast.
• Goodbye newborn and size 2 diapers, Poise pads, and cloth tape.
• Goodbye 3 and 4T onesies.
• Goodbye solo sock.
• Goodbye sponge baths.
• Goodbye unpleasant sweat and urine smell.
• Goodbye checking diaper and related paraphernalia every 45 minutes.
• Goodbye boot worn to protect his toes when he sleeps on his belly.
• Goodbye checking for pressure sores.
• Goodbye alarm set for 3 am.
• Goodbye Britax Hippo car seat.
• Goodbye fluid rationing before bedtime.
• Goodbye careful power-lifting techniques.
• Goodbye green Jeep stroller (and thank you - you were a much better mode of transportation than a wagon could have ever been!)
• Goodbye "mama - come roll me over on my belly!" at odd hours of the night/morning.
• Goodbye lap tray.
• Goodbye crumb-filled and sticky couch cushion.

And we will say hello to... a lot of unknowns. Some of the simple, logistical "knowns":

• Hello pants, pair of socks, and shoes.
• Hello size 5 diapers.
• Hello bathtub!
• Hello old carseat and stroller(s).
• Hello booster seat and kitchen table.

But other than those practical matters, we have no idea what it will really be like. Will it take Zach a couple days to be comfortable walking again, or a couple weeks? Will he play cars by himself or continue to want us to play - nonstop? Will he ever want to play something other than cars? Will he realize right away he can roll himself over in his crib, or will he still cry out in the middle of the night for one of us to come and roll him over? Will he still want to watch tv as much as he does now? Will he want to go out in the world again, or continue to prefer the safety of home? Will he ever eat vegetables again?

We can't tell how much we're looking forward to finding out.

Privacy

Last night Zach asked for some water, and when Scott gave it to him, he sort of loomed over him on the couch, teasing him a little. Zach looked up and said "Daddy, I need some privacy to drink my water."

We both just froze and then looked at each other, exchanging "where does he get this stuff???" looks. When Scott asked what privacy was, the answer was "letting me do something so I can."

Now, I can remember using the word once or twice, usually in reference to the bathroom. But it's been a long time - obviously before the cast, but I think it's been months. And it's not something I said often, since I've more or less resigned myself to company in the bathroom. It really is amazing what his little mind is retaining... and yet another reminder to be careful what we say!

I was also equally amused by what Zach said after he drank his water. Scott had moved to the other end of the couch, and Zach looked at him and said "thanks for letting me drink my water."

October 12th?

While it may not be unusual in Montana, this is not what I expected to see when I looked out the window today:


And it's now almost 1:00 pm, and it's still snowing! Basically, it has been a nice day to stay inside and play... cars.



In less than 72 hours, the cast will be lying in the trash somewhere! :)

Life is a Highway

Well, if life truly is a highway, then we're almost to the end of this little broken femur detour. Or maybe it's a construction zone? A speed bump? A radar trap? Ok, enough of that analogy; you'll see the real reason this post is titled as it is below.

Our countdown has begun in earnest. At first we were counting the days until G&G Klicka arrived on Wednesday, knowing that time would fly by while they were here, and then we'd only have 5 days left in the cast! And we were right, it was wonderful having my parents here, for all of us. Besides the fact that there were extra hands to play with Zach, they also gave me the opportunity to do things like run to Target on my own. Exciting, I know!

Best of all, Scott and I got to go curling Friday night! That's right, it's curling season already. We started out the season with a win, although not exactly a strong one. But hey, it was the first time we've thrown rocks in six months! I can't tell you how good it felt to be out of the house, able to forget for a short time that we were the parents of a child in a spica cast. Instead we were just two curlers, having fun with our teammates Adam and Jamie, savoring a few drinks to celebrate our win (and drown our sorrows over the Twins painful loss). So a big thanks to my parents for making it all possible.

I didn't even bring my camera out once while my parents were here! Perhaps that's because if I had, all you would see is pictures of Zach playing cars. Despite the fact that I've said it many many times, I think my parents were still surprised that playing cars is literally all Zach wants to do! It's the first thing he says when he wakes up in the morning and from his nap, and he exacts a promise from us before he goes to sleep that he can play cars when he's done sleeping.

Zach's interest rose to a whole new level when my parents got here, since they brought him pretty much all of the characters from Cars, as well as a playmat that depicts the setting of the movie. Last week he had two of the major characters from the movie, and a few of the minor ones too. Now he has almost all of them - the stars and the supporting cast; and he definitely has new favorites. He will sit there with a few of the cars and quote the lines from the movie - basically recreating some of the scenes. Scary. I will take a picture of him and all his new favorites soon.

I did pull out the video camera a few days ago, to capture a new song Zach likes to sing. From the soundtrack of Cars, of course...

Spica cast days completed: 31

Extremely malodorous spica cast days remaining: 4

A new trick

The new trick isn't bowling, I just included that picture to show yet another way we play with Zach's cars. Try not to notice Zach's raging bedhead.

No, unfortunately Zach's new trick is rolling over. (I am constantly reminded how this entire time in the cast has reminded me of the first few months of Zach's life ... now I'm talking about him learning to roll over??? And soon we'll be updating you on how he's learning - re-learning - to walk?!?!? We're going backwards! Crazy.) Anyway, the reason it's unfortunate is that he can only roll from his front to his back. So, in the middle of the night, when he decides to roll onto his back, he can't get over again to his much-preferred belly-sleeping position. Sunday night Scott got to go find out what the screaming was about, so when I put Zach to bed last night, I made sure we had a talk about how he should stay on his belly. Did it work? What do you think?

The first time he woke up, he again did so screaming, at about 12:45. When I went in his room, he calmly said "Mama, I'm on my back and I can't roll over to my belly, see - uhh, uhh." (Sound effects are apparently supposed to highlight how hard he was trying.) So we talked again about how he should stay on his stomach, and both of us went back to sleep. At 3:36, instead of screaming, I heard "Mama! I rolled on my back again and can't roll onto my belly!" Sigh. When I walked into his room, he was once again wide awake and ready to talk, telling me how he didn't listen to me, that he'd rolled over again. No kidding. Let's just hope this is a short-lived phase!!

Grandma and Grandpa Klicka arrive today - hooray hooray!

Spica cast days completed: 27
Stinky, smelly spica cast days remaining: 8

A new way to play

As I've been doing more on-line research on kids in spica casts, I've been quite amazed at the very creative ways parents have tried to keep their kids occupied. One mom, despite have seven (yes, 7!) children, makes custom tables that kids in spica casts can sit upright in, which provides them a play surface, and also rocks. Genius! I've read a lot of stories and seen videos of kids scooting and even walking in their casts, which is something our doctor strongly discouraged. It was amazing to see that walking was even possible, but I guess you should never underestimate the will of a toddler! One particularly funny video showed a 3-year old doing the "spica spin" - laying on the kitchen floor on his stomach spinning himself in circles. Made me dizzy just to watch!

Inspired by this information, a week or so ago we tried putting Zach on the kitchen floor to see what he thought, if he'd want to scoot around, etc. He wasn't so sure about it at first, and definitely wasn't interested in the spica spin. But he now loves playing on the kitchen floor. What are we playing? Occasionally we can get him to bowl, but mostly it's cars, of course! He can scoot himself around a little, and really enjoys a new way to zoom his cars around. Collisions seem to be his favorite new activity - crash!


Other than playing cars, we tried a new activity last week - a play. There's a theater that puts on children's shows in Hopkins (http://www.stagestheatre.org/), so I thought this was a good time to see what Zach thought of live theater. He was captivated by the singing and dancing... for a while anyway. The play was based on a book called "I Like Me," and while it had a great message - to love yourself and not worry about what others might think - there wasn't much of an actual story to follow. So after about 45 minutes of the hour-long show, Zach was done. I decided to call it a success, even though he told me later he didn't have any fun. Stinker.

In other random news, I wanted to share some recent funny stories about Zach and his memory. Several times, Zach has both amazed and made me laugh when he wakes up and immediately (seemingly before he's even fully awake!) talks about something we discussed right before he went to sleep. Saturday night, as I was putting Zach to bed, I said something to Scott about needing to put the clean sheets back on our bed. Zach asked me some questions about it - why we needed sheets, etc. The next morning, right after I asked him how he slept and rolled him over to change his diaper, he asked me if we'd put the sheets on the bed. It took me a while to even figure out what he was talking about, since "sheets" sounded more like "seeds," and I had totally forgotten about the conversation. But he sure hadn't!

Lately Zach has been protesting pretty vehemently about going to bed (just a new phase, or cast related??). When I put him down for his nap yesterday, he was telling me he didn't want to sleep, he wanted to play cars. I told him that after he got a good sleep that Daddy and I would play cars with him (again). When he woke up, he told me he was ready to play. I was carrying him downstairs, telling him that we needed to change his diaper first, and he said "Mama, you said when I woke up, Daddy, you, and me would play. Changing my diaper is NOT playing!!!" I shudder to think about the debates we'll have as this kid gets older!


Spica cast days completed: 25
Spica cast days remaining: 10

Still the kid

I recently posted some pictures on Facebook; a collection from the entire summer ending with some of the same cast pictures I've posted here. Someone responded how amazing it was to see the difference in Zach's demeanor - pre and post-cast. That comment made me realize that while I usually put a lot of effort into getting a picture of Zach looking at the camera and smiling (I probably take 8 unsuccessful pictures for every one that meets those criteria!), I hadn't bothered when I took the pictures of him in the cast. I just wanted to show what the cast itself looked like, and how we were adapting - I wasn't even thinking about the look on Zach's face.

So I decided to rectify that.

I think I've been a little too focused on the negative on these last posts, when I should be celebrating the same stuff I usually am - what a funny, smart, loving kid we have. Even though he can't move most of his lower body, Zach is still the kid who likes to make up jokes, gets really excited when he spots a number he knows when we're out and about (mom - there's 100!!!), recites large portions of his Doctor Seuss books, asks "why" so ofen my head spins, changes the lyrics to songs just to make us laugh, invites everyone to his house to play, wants to know what words he sees on signs spell, and says things like "I'm the bombigity." He is now also the kid who says I love you a lot more than he used to. No complaints here about that.

Zach also is now the kid who can quote lines from the movie Cars - I had no idea guys started quoting movies this young! My favorite though, is when he gets the quote wrong, and then tries to defend his version. For example, there's a line "I ain't no Mack, I'm a Peterbuilt for durn sake!" He thinks they say "Firebuilt," and if we try to correct him, he says no, and very patiently explains that a Firebuilt is a truck with fire coming out of it. Okey dokey, if you say so.

This experience has taught us so many things; as we sat in the emergency room Scott and I agreed that while it was the most horrible night of our lives, if that was as bad as it got - we were extremely lucky people. You can't sit in a pediatric ward in a hospital and not be grateful you're only there for one night, because there are so clearly many others who have been there so long they've turned those rooms into their homes. And of course, every time I struggle to handle the most basic tasks, from lifting this boy to transporting him to figuring out how to position him so he can play, I have to remind myself it's temporary. Only temporary, thank god.

So I've posted some pictures of Zach that way he usually looks - smiling (but not looking at the camera, of course, laughing instead at his dad). And video of him telling his jokes, changing them until they don't make any sense, and giving a big fake laugh. Because he's still that kid.

Spica cast days completed: 23

Spica cast days remaining: 12