Towards the end of July, we took Eve to see an orthopedic specialist about her legs/feet. She's been a toe walker basically since she learned how to walk and, with most children, that resolves itself by around age 5. Since Eve is 6 1/2 and it still hadn't, the pediatrician referred her and we went in.
In his examination, the doctor determined that her muscle spasticity was fine, but that the problem was her heel cords - they are too tight. Solution? Either day and night braces, along with physical therapy or surgery to cut/stretch them. Even though Eve's case is advanced, he opted to go with the braces.
So, behold Eve's day braces!
She got to choose the pattern herself at The Brace Place, then they took casts of her legs to create just the right braces for her. She gets to wear these all day, every day for 6 months.
As I write this, we're exactly 7 weeks into wearing the day braces and it has been a rough experience! Eve got her day braces on August 1st. She's doing much better now, but the first few weeks were very painful. Her legs/feet aren't used to being held fast at a 90 degree angle! She would cry and cry, begging for a break from the braces every hour or so. I was so worried about her starting school! How could she leave them on all day at school if she couldn't last more than an hour at home? And would the other kids tease her about them???
A lot of prayers have been said for this sweet girl, and boy have they been answered! Up until Eve started first grade, she was not able to leave the braces on for extended periods of time, but from her first day of school until now, she hasn't had to take her braces off at school even one time! And she's only had to take her tennis shoes off once. We are amazed and humbled by how blessed she's been!
She's supposed to wear tennis shoes over the braces at all times (to prevent slipping) and that was almost the hardest part for her. She got to the point where she could wear the braces by themselves, but adding the shoes was just still too painful. Around the house, I often let her take the shoes off, as long as she walks carefully, and that's been mostly successful, with only a few slips.
In addition to her day braces, the doctor also prescribed night braces, which look more like walking boots. She started these immediately (they didn't have to be fitted to her specific size) so she's been in these for almost 9 weeks. They have been almost worse than the day braces because she hasn't been able to sleep at night. And everything's worse when you're tired!
Her first night with braces we found she had company in her bed, which probably didn't help!
For the first several weeks, we had her sleeping on the floor of our room so we could help her at night when the braces woke her up. She would wake up crying from the pain about every hour or so at first. We were all so tired, poor Eve most of all! She gradually improved, but we are still having problems with the night braces, the biggest being that she now removes them in her sleep without realizing it. And since she's back to sleeping in her own room, we don't know about it either until we find them off in the morning.
So, overall, we're all doing the best we can and Eve has been a champ about the whole thing. Not an easy thing for a 6 year old to do, but she's trying! She goes back in November for an evaluation so we'll know more at that point.
Can't slow this girl down!
And so far, the kids at school have been nice to Eve about them. Most commonly, they're mistaken for soccer shin guards or she gets asked if she broke both her legs! She also wears them with her tennis shoes to church on Sunday and the other kids in primary think that's pretty cool.
Oh, and I should mention that we do her physical therapy at home - 20 stretches on each leg, 10 seconds long each, every morning and evening. It takes about 10 minutes. She likes to read or play games on my phone while we do the stretches. It's made our morning and evening routines just a little longer and crazier than usual.
2 months down, at least 4 more to go!
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