Mia's hip saga: Still Not Over!
Yes, we thought we had moved beyond Mia's hip problems. We're foolish mortals, yes we are.
Her hip is still fine. At least there's that. But here's the problem: On Monday, 31 August, Mia went to bed fine. She had been doing well with her rehab, even walking a little bit with her PT, and we were getting her standing a lot more. However, sometime in the night of 31 August-1 September, something happened. We're not exactly sure what. She didn't cry out in pain during the night, or if we did, we didn't hear her. When she woke up in the morning her legs were really stiff, and she wasn't happy. Over the next two days she was extremely tight, to the point even when she was sitting, she would twitch a little and start crying. It was somewhat frustrating. Eventually, she started to calm down when she was sitting, but she still didn't want to straighten her legs out. After a week of this, I took her to her pediatrician just to eliminate the idea that she had an infection. She didn't have any infection, and her pediatrician worked on her hip for a little and she didn't scream in pain. He thought it was just that her muscles were really, really tight and she needed to stretch more. We still didn't know why her muscles would suddenly be so tight, but okay.
We continued to work on her muscles. I called her orthopedic surgeon and spoke to his nurse, who said that if there was something really wrong with her hip, she'd be getting worse and the pain would be more intense at night, but she was sleeping fine. So we kept stretching her. This week, however, her PT was working on her, and after an hour of stretching her, the muscle on the inside of her groin was still extremely tight. Her PT said that if it was just a case of her muscles being tight, stretching would work, but it's not. So I called the orthopedic surgeon back and got her in for an X-ray. Yay, X-rays!
Mia went in on Thursday for the X-ray. I'm still not sure what the deal is, because I have to e-mail the doctor to get his opinion. He told me what he thinks, but I don't want to get it wrong. On her right leg, there's a triangle coming from her femur toward her groin. He said it was a bone, but I don't understand how that wouldn't freak him out and get her into surgery right away. He said he'd have to compare it to her old X-rays, but he didn't think it was that big a deal. He told me we'd just have to "let it heal," and that he wanted her to come back in four weeks. I'm still not sure what's wrong with her. It's nothing major, obviously, because she doesn't need more surgery. He said we should keep stretching her, and whatever she can handle in therapy is fine, but we shouldn't push her too much.
She is getting better, but it's still tough picking her up and moving her around. We are once again putting on her leg braces at night to keep her legs straight, which she seems to appreciate, but she wasn't happy about the foam wedge that was keeping her legs apart. Her adductor muscles are so tight that separating her legs really bothers her, so we figure it's better to work on the adductors by stretching them in therapy rather than putting the wedge on. We hope we can put it on her soon, because it does a good job stretching her adductors. If only she would leave it alone instead of weeping when we put it on her.
So we're still working with her, and we're still in the dark as to what happened to her. Her PT thinks she may have been sleeping in an odd position (we had stopped putting the leg braces on because she didn't seem to need them) and had a seizure or muscle spasm and twisted an odd way. That's really the only thing we can think of, as it definitely happened when she was in bed and therefore not moving too much. We hope that it doesn't happen, again, obviously, whatever it was! But as long as her surgeon isn't too freaked out by it, we're not going to be. We just need to keep her loose and hope whatever is afflicting her heals and she begin rehabilitating in earnest. That would be nice.
Her hip is still fine. At least there's that. But here's the problem: On Monday, 31 August, Mia went to bed fine. She had been doing well with her rehab, even walking a little bit with her PT, and we were getting her standing a lot more. However, sometime in the night of 31 August-1 September, something happened. We're not exactly sure what. She didn't cry out in pain during the night, or if we did, we didn't hear her. When she woke up in the morning her legs were really stiff, and she wasn't happy. Over the next two days she was extremely tight, to the point even when she was sitting, she would twitch a little and start crying. It was somewhat frustrating. Eventually, she started to calm down when she was sitting, but she still didn't want to straighten her legs out. After a week of this, I took her to her pediatrician just to eliminate the idea that she had an infection. She didn't have any infection, and her pediatrician worked on her hip for a little and she didn't scream in pain. He thought it was just that her muscles were really, really tight and she needed to stretch more. We still didn't know why her muscles would suddenly be so tight, but okay.
We continued to work on her muscles. I called her orthopedic surgeon and spoke to his nurse, who said that if there was something really wrong with her hip, she'd be getting worse and the pain would be more intense at night, but she was sleeping fine. So we kept stretching her. This week, however, her PT was working on her, and after an hour of stretching her, the muscle on the inside of her groin was still extremely tight. Her PT said that if it was just a case of her muscles being tight, stretching would work, but it's not. So I called the orthopedic surgeon back and got her in for an X-ray. Yay, X-rays!
Mia went in on Thursday for the X-ray. I'm still not sure what the deal is, because I have to e-mail the doctor to get his opinion. He told me what he thinks, but I don't want to get it wrong. On her right leg, there's a triangle coming from her femur toward her groin. He said it was a bone, but I don't understand how that wouldn't freak him out and get her into surgery right away. He said he'd have to compare it to her old X-rays, but he didn't think it was that big a deal. He told me we'd just have to "let it heal," and that he wanted her to come back in four weeks. I'm still not sure what's wrong with her. It's nothing major, obviously, because she doesn't need more surgery. He said we should keep stretching her, and whatever she can handle in therapy is fine, but we shouldn't push her too much.
She is getting better, but it's still tough picking her up and moving her around. We are once again putting on her leg braces at night to keep her legs straight, which she seems to appreciate, but she wasn't happy about the foam wedge that was keeping her legs apart. Her adductor muscles are so tight that separating her legs really bothers her, so we figure it's better to work on the adductors by stretching them in therapy rather than putting the wedge on. We hope we can put it on her soon, because it does a good job stretching her adductors. If only she would leave it alone instead of weeping when we put it on her.
So we're still working with her, and we're still in the dark as to what happened to her. Her PT thinks she may have been sleeping in an odd position (we had stopped putting the leg braces on because she didn't seem to need them) and had a seizure or muscle spasm and twisted an odd way. That's really the only thing we can think of, as it definitely happened when she was in bed and therefore not moving too much. We hope that it doesn't happen, again, obviously, whatever it was! But as long as her surgeon isn't too freaked out by it, we're not going to be. We just need to keep her loose and hope whatever is afflicting her heals and she begin rehabilitating in earnest. That would be nice.
posted by Greg at
2:05 PM
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