8th week of treatment

Starbaby is now in his 7th cast, and his 8th week of talipes treatment through the Ponseti method.

Yesterday's cast change wasn't much fun. The top of his foot is getting sore again and one of the nurses doing his casting upset me by saying a few things, including that it would 'get worse when he's in boots and bars'. :( I was feeling very fragile... it's hard going back to the hospital every week where there are reminders everywhere of Starbaby's tough early days... and felt very disheartened when his foot was graded the same as it was 4 weeks ago (2.5).

I think the nurse felt I was questioning the treatment he was getting, which I wasn't... I was just having a bit of an emotional-outpouring-moment about how hard it is to see my precious little boy hurting and with no end in sight for the casting stage yet. A little sensitivity would have gone a long way. This is hard.

I just hope next week his sore hasn't opened, meaning another week off casts, and another regression.. It's disheartening for his foot to be the same as it was after just 3 weeks of treatment, yet we have been going for 7 weeks.

Starbaby had a lovely bath. However, the clinic is getting pretty busy so we didn't spend too much time in the bathing room (which we were already sharing with one other lovely family) as we knew there were others waiting.

Here is Starbaby and his feet after 6 weeks of casts... getting there... slowly.

... and this next photo was was meant to be of his foot but my little point-and-shoot camera focused in the wrong spot (I usually photograph with my lovely SLR but use the little camera for hospital or quite capture-the-moment shots at home. But the reason I'm sharing it as it shows that Starbaby can now get his hands up to his face, and he's having a good go at sucking them!! He can't suck his thumb or fingers 'properly' because of the angle his wrists are at, and the lack of movement in his fingers, but he is really trying hard! 

There's so much that I took for granted with Big Sis but is utterly amazing this time round. He has major difficulties in moving his arms, hands and fingers but with lots of exercises and activities he's improving quite a bit. So proud!

One little foot, one big pressure sore...

Another angle... looking nice and straight again (after relapsing during our cast-free week) but still quite a way still to go to lift the foot up (if you look back to previous weeks you'll see we're around the stage we were after 3 casts now).

I just want to kiss this beautiful little foot! Comparing this photo to the 'sole' one from last week makes me feel a bit better. Even if his score didn't change, his foot did improve a little.