A Whole New Hand

Today was the big day!  Goodbye, stinky disgusto cast, and hello new hand!

I think all casts probably smell not-so-fresh after a month, but toddler casts?  Uck.  Toddler casts after soaking them for an hour so they're easy to remove?  Unbelievably uck.  Seriously, words do not describe.

Anyway, [trying hard not to fixate on the memory of the stench] the cast removal was super easy and rather unceremonious.  I guess after living with that thing for 4 weeks, I expected some sort of drama regarding its removal but (thankfully) there was none - the nurse cut it open and WanYing pulled her hand out easy as pie (that's why you soak it, so that the bandages don't stick)!

Admittedly, and unsurprisingly, the hand looked kinda grosso at first.  I mean, a month's worth of dead skin and surgery scabs is kind of destined to look icky.  But even amid the yuck the miracle was right there before us - a thumb and four fingers, all free!  Amazing!

At first, WanYing was fine with it.  I think that she was just relieved to have that blasted cast off.  Then she kind of freaked out.  I think it was all just (understandably) too much for her - she didn't want to look at her hand and just nestled in my arms for a few minutes. 

But once the shock subsided,  she started poking those fingers and moving them around, rubbing off the ick, and insisting on washing her hands.  She is simply amazing - if I took off a cast to find a whole new hand, you better believe that I'd need more than a couple of minutes of cuddling to get used to the idea!

I love this picture - can't you just see the wheels turning in her head as she makes sense of all this craziness?

The whole thing was so ridiculously easy.  Dr. Wang checked her out and gave us the all-clear with the simplest of instructions - we're supposed to rub the scars with vitamin E oil to help them subside and help her fingers to be less sensitive, we need to encourage two-handed activities, and we need to give her a variety of textures to play with to help her new fingers and now-exposed palm to be less sensitive.  Oh, and she has a silicone spacer (basically a cast of her palm) that she's supposed to wear at night to help her hand stretch and provide pressure for the scars so that they heal nicely. That's it!  We come back for a checkup in 2 months and may need to do OT at that point, but for now we just get to let her be a toddler and figure her hand out on her own.

WanYing was a little extra fussy and clingy tonight, but other than that was no worse for the day's adventures. We headed to Red Butte Garden for a quick picnic lunch and then it was back to life as usual.

She still favors the pinky, of course, but check out those gorgeous new fingers!

It was tough to get a photo of her open hand, but here it is!

A close-up of her new hand!  If you need a reminder of what her hand looked like before, check out, "Sticky Hand No Longer?"

She is so beautiful - hands, feet, face, the whole package!

WanYing, you are simply fabulous.