Caleb's hands at birth.

Caleb's hands at birth.

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Another Deformity?

(After first sugery)
When Caleb was about two weeks old, I began doing some research on the syndactyly thing. I found some useful sites. I also found some sites that scared me to death. I found out when a child has syndactyly there is usually something else... What did this mean? What else could my baby have? There are other types of syndromes linked to syndactyly. I asked myself many questions, as well the doctors. The doctors kept on telling me everything was ok. I believed them. But for some reason I always knew that syndactyly wasn’t the only thing my baby had. I blocked my horrible thoughts not knowing one day they will resurface and might possibly be true.  Caleb was healthy enough for his first surgery, at the ripe ole age of three months. The doctors had separated his pinky fingers from his ring fingers. They had to separate bones in order to make him full fingers. When Caleb was six months old he had his second surgery. They separated both middle fingers from the ring fingers. He recoverd from both surgries with ease. He was a trooper. His fingers healed and he was using them like a normal baby! He moved each finger separately and the bows in his fingers began to correct them self. I had a normal baby with normal fingers. Wow. Some women get post partum depression after their babies are born. I never did. I am grateful for that.  But, I was pretty depressed after the finger surgeries on Caleb. I missed his tiny fingers that were webbed together; we used to joke that if we were to keep Caleb’s fingers webbed, that he would make a great swimmer! Michael Phelps watch out!  Instead of having post-partum depression, I believed I had post-webbing depression. I really missed his webbed fingers. Those fingers were Caleb's. And I loved them.

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