Tripler Army Medical Center, AKA "Crippler" or "The Pink Palace"
Jake had his appointment with the pediatric orthopedic surgeon yesterday and overall, I think it went great. He did a pretty thorough exam and really seemed to know his stuff. Not only are Jake's feet extremely flat, but the tendons are too tight, limiting his range of motion. He can fix both of those things through surgery. He was also very personable. Jake brought up Scouting (talking about not wanting to miss Scout camp) and it turns out, the Dr. is also a Scoutmaster. Also, I think he might be LDS. I thought I picked up on a faint Utah accent...and there's just this radar thing with Mormons. Hard to explain. Not being one to ask strangers about their religious beliefs...especially strangers who are going to be cutting on my children, I will have to see if I can think of some subtle way to find out. Because I'm nosy like that.
Unfortunately, the Dr. will not do both feet at once. This is not what we were lead to believe by the podiatrist. He said it's just not a good idea for a normally ambulatory kid his age. I totally trust his judgement, but I did put a few factoids out there for his consideration, like the fact that Jake is homeschooling now, but wants to go back to school next year, and it would be nice to have his recovery over by then...and that now I have an 18 year old to help with his care, but I won't have that past this summer. He said he'd take my request (to do both at once) under consideration...but honestly, I think he was just being nice. We'll do what we've gotta do...although the thought of having to do this trip twice is SO not appealing.
At first, he said we'd have to go back to Okinawa and wait for a surgery date. I was kind of bummed about having to make that flight THREE times, but not surprised. He sent us back out to the waiting room while he consulted the surgery schedule and said he'd send a nurse out with the paperwork. {Jake was hopeful for a date after Scout camp, so he'd still be able to attend.} After about 15 minutes, a nurse came out with an extension of orders for us to stay until April 15th, and an appt. line-up for next week, including a couple of pre-op appts and a surgery date. She just started explaining things as if I knew we were staying, so I was a bit confused at first...but then so relieved we were staying! Jake was not relieved. So much for Scout camp.
Of course, as we were leaving, I realized now I wouldn't have the opportunity to ask all of my burning questions. It's been frustrating that we've had to go all these months with so few details, and then this appt. happened so fast and since I thought we were coming back for the surgery another time, I didn't think to get more details while I had the surgeon's attention. For example, he mentioned he'd be using bone to build the arch. Bone from where? One of the possibilities the podiatrist mentioned involved taking bone from the heel to insert into the arch. This option had the longest recovery. {Yikes!} Some of the other options involved using plastic or metal hardware. The surgeon didn't say anything about that. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to make a list of questions for our pre-op appt. on Monday. Like how long he's going to be in the hospital, how long is the surgery, how long will he be off his feet, etc.
Whatever will we do with a week in Hawaii while we wait?
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