A Poopy Day

Our much-anticipated visit to orthopedics on Tuesday was discouraging. We were hoping that they would tell us the Taylor-spatial frame was ready to come off, but it was not to be. They saw nothing wrong and said that healing is progressing as they hope, but it just has not progressed far enough. If we have a miracle, he'll get it off before Christmas, but it is more likely that he'll get if off after Christmas. Seth was really hoping to be able to wear normal long pants when we come home at Christmas.

Seth also met with the urologist and a physical therapist who specializes in urological issues. No bad news, but no good news either. They will begin some therapy in January to help bring things back online.

For some reason, his tailbone pain is increasing rather than decreasing. One doctor hypothesized this was nerves regenerating, but the ortho doctors disagreed. However, they didn't provide another explanation. Seth's X-ray showed his pelvis has thrown down some extra bone--heterotopic ossification or, as it is referred to here, HO--but that didn't appear to be in the area where the pain is originating.

HO is defined as excees bone growth in soft tissues that frequently occurs in the residula limbs of combat amputees. It's almost like the body is trying to regrow the missing bone. Depending on how the HO grows, it can cause a great deal of pain or cause a previously fitting prosthesis to no longer fit comfortably. So far, Seth has not had to deal with this in his leg, for which we are very grateful, but it's too soon to say whether he won't develop HO issues. (More information on HO here).

  

The best news of the week is that Seth got his new custom wheelchair. It is sleeker, smaller, faster and lighter, so now I can hardly keep up with him!

Free Food Fiasco

Over the weekend, many restaurants had deals for Veterans Day. We were particularly excited about Golden Corral's offer, mostly because of the chocolate fountains they have been advertising recently. The offer was good on Monday evening from 5 to 9 p.m. So we headed out with Chang and Thung. It was a 20-mile drive to the nearest GC, but again, we figured chocolate fountains were worth it. When we arrived, there was a line, five people across, completely encircling the building. Even we have our limits when it comes to free food, so we headed across the street to Kobe Japanese Steakhouse where we had a delicious dinner around the hibachi grill--and I caught the shrimp.