Additional Needs
Age Appropriate
by Jodi Shenal
on 26th April, 2024
When Things Don’t Go as Planned
Sawyer needs both of his hips fixed. One is totally out resulting in a 4-inch difference in his leg length. We have been battling with this decision but after meeting with all doctors and therapists they agreed it’s best for him. We decided to proceed forward and schedule his surgery for January 2020.
In December Sawyer got influenza B (despite his flu shot), pneumonia as a result of influenza and GI upset due to the pedialyte we had to give him to keep him hydrated. This resulted in not only a 3-day hospital stay but also a loss of 5 full pounds. He was very skinny and we could not imagine putting him through the 7 hour surgery and 6 week body cast that followed for his hip surgery.
We knew it was the right decision and selfishly I was relieved. I was anxious about the surgery.
Fast forward to this month and we finally got a new surgery date. We have been quarantined since the pandemic, avoiding social outings and being overall very careful. We are beginning to see pain and adverse effects due to the hip being so far out. The surgery was scheduled for October 2nd, notice I said “was”. I spent 3 weeks not sleeping, being extremely anxious and stressing about the surgery.
Four days before his surgery Sawyer’s twin sister, Quinn, came down with a cold. We not only kept him away from sister as much as possible but we sanitized before we got close to him after touching her. The day before his surgery he came down with a cold. It’s taken 10 days for him to get over it and unfortunately, we had to cancel surgery AGAIN.
It’s been a stressful and emotional rollercoaster.
We go from feeling extremely anxious to relief to stress to being anxious again. It’s not easy but we are trying very hard to look towards our faith and as our doctor said “Sometimes it’s God’s way of saying not to.” We are planning on rescheduling his surgery because we are finally seeing some pain and signs that it is necessary, unlike a year ago. Things will happen when they are meant to and often times the hardest part of being a parent is letting go and holding on to faith.
