Surgery....Ouch!!!

Big toe surgery day has finally arrived. Here is the story. Just prior to our move here I took Kayden into the Dr. because he had a "funky" big toe nail on his left foot. The Dr. informed me it was due to wearing shoes that were too small and it would grow itself out in a year or so. About a year and a half later this same big toe got very infected while at volleyball practice. So we got a reference to a Dr. here in Mesa. This Dr. said, HUM...I could clip away the ingrown toe nail but I've never seen one grow quite like this, I'd rather send you to a podiatrist. About a week later we were at the podiatrist office, at this point I personally thought his toe nail looked pretty good because we'd been soaking it and putting ointment on it. The first girl to look at it laughed and said it was still very infected and began freezing his toe before the Dr. even saw him. They removed his toenail but decided to take a x-ray just to see why his toe nail was growing the way it was. Discovery...a bone spur / cancer (not the bad kind) was the culpurit. Now at this point we are in volleyball season and the idea of having "surgery" that will put you out for the season didn't seem exciting, nor did the cost of surgery. We were initially told he would be in a walking boot for 6 weeks and there would be no swimming for that amount of time. So we decided to have the surgery done later in the year.

When I took him for his pre-op the Dr. said he would be in a walking shoe and only for about 4 weeks, plus miss 3-4 days of school. Yesterday when we went in for surgery the Dr. said he could go to school Monday but probably leave class a few minutes early so his foot didn't get stepped on in the hall and he'd only be in the shoe for 2 weeks. The Dr's main concern this weekend was pain and taking it easy.

In the recovery room I was a little nervous, Kayden was acting a little "loopie", repeating himself and telling the nurse funny things, very much out of character. Apparently he was good to go a few minutes later, they took out his IV and loaded him up in the car with instructions to take it easy and not have visitors over so he could rest. I left the house for a few minutes that evening to grab him a sub sandwich and before I got home there were 7 girls over with cookies and well wishes. So much for taking it easy.

As of this afternoon he is off visiting with friends, pain free and not on any medication. I guess it wasn't much to worry about. My only concern now is being in the room next Thursday when they finally take the bandage off his foot and change the dressing...Stinky!!!