The roller coaster continues

Gabbie got her braces last week. At first she didn't like them. But she doesn't like anything on her feet anyway. She spends a lot of time trying to remove shoes and socks whenever she can, so it was no surprise that she was going to try to remove the braces too. But the velcro is strong and goes around, so she hasn't figured it out yet. She doesn't seem too bothered by the braces, though - at least not any more than she is bothered by regular shoes. She is still crawling and doing everything she was doing before them. She tends to curl her toes and push the feet upward, and it defeats the purpose of the braces if she is trying to pull her feet up, so we needed to find shoes to go over the braces to pull the toes down, since the velcro part does not go all the way to the toes.

 We literally spent hours looking for shoes, going in every single store and department store at the mall, trying many pairs on, and still have not found one that fits perfectly. We bought a couple of pairs that will do for now, but eventually we will need to buy the hatchbacks that are made for that purpose. They are expensive ($60-70) and they wouldn't be ready before our holiday trip, so we decided to wait for when we come back.

Then yesterday we had the appointment with the orthopedic surgeon. He is a very nice doctor, very personal, very caring. He said that just by reading her files, he thought her condition was much worse, and he was very pleased with what he saw. He said it is not bad at all, but remember - he sees a lot of stuff, so not being bad at all may not mean really that. It just means that, putting in perspective, it could be much worse. He said that she has some flexibility in her feet, and with this condition, it was at its absolutely worse at birth, and that it is not going to get any worse, it will just improve from now. The level of improvement is what is still up in the air. It will depend on how much Gabbie will be able to do in the coming months and years. He doesn't want to rush into surgery because he believes she will stretch much of the contractures herself when she tries to stand and walk. Just like the doctor at Shriners, he believes that the brain commands these things, and since her brain is normal, she should be able to get up and try. And by trying, she will be stretching. And in the future, whatever she can't stretch, then maybe we will think about surgeries. It is a roller coaster. Not only of emotions, but of medical opinions. Every time we see a different doctor, we hear something different. First we hear "be ready for surgeries, she will need many of them and lots of physical therapy", now we hear different. We want to believe in this so badly that we are afraid of believing just to hear something different next month. I want to be able to run in the steady part of the roller coaster for a while. I want to believe that everything will be ok and soon. I want to believe that next year she will be walking. But I can't. Because part of me wants to be ready for the possibility that it doesn't happen that way. Because the more ready I am, the more I can help her. So call me a pessimist, but those of you who know me well, know that I have always been the Pollyanna, I have always been the one to see the bright side of things, but now it hit home too close. So I am hoping for the best, preparing for the worst, like that feeling that you have when you are going up on the roller coaster, but you know that it will go down at some point, you just don't know how soon or how bad, and then hopefully it is just a bump and the ride ends.