The Meidam Family: "Toddler Fracture"

Yes - "Toddler Fracture" - a new term that has been added to my vocabulary. Alayna has a "toddler fracture". "How did this happen?" you ask. Answer - WE HAVE NO IDEA! How's that for making you feel like the worst parents ever! Saturday I thought she was possibly walking a bit odd. Well - at the time I noticed she was walking on the grass. I simply figured it was because she was walking on grass and the grass was uneven which made her walk that way. Sunday rolled around and I didn't see her walk or pay attention to the way she was walking really until after dinner. We were at church in the morning, the air show in the afternoon - she really hadn't had much of a chance to do a lot of walking. Well then evening rolled around and I noticed there was a limp. Brian could see it too. We both thought it was so strange b/c we had no idea what had happened. We tried to figure out what it was that was bothering her...her foot, hip, leg, ankle. No luck. We thought it was maybe her ankle but it wasn't swollen or anything. So - a mystery.

Monday morning I took her to the pediatrician. Yup - something definitely causing her to not walk normal. Off to get x-rays. X-ray results showed a small fracture to her left fibula (lower leg bone). We were to call Children's ortho and schedule an appt to likely cast her leg the following day (Tuesday). Tuesday morning at 7:15 we got to the drs office. They looked at it and classified the fracture as a stress fracture. Something that was very small and could have happened by something as simple as her kicking her crib really hard (which I don't think she did b/c she doesn't really do that - but was the drs example). So - the drs said no cast - WHEW - to watch it over the next few days and make sure it doesn't get worse, feel warm, look red or swollen, etc. We were sent for a blood test as well to insure there was not infection anywhere. Alayna had been running a bit of a fever - but nothing more than she would get with teething which is what I assumed it was from. She's not eating great these days so I'm thinking teeth are coming in as well. ANYWAY - we were SO thankful not to have a cast. What fun would summer be in a leg cast - no sandbox to sit in, no bathtub, no swimming, no fun at the lake...NO THANKS! We received a call later Tues morning with the results of the blood test and those results were all normal as well. One was slightly elevated - however that could have been caused by the teething (is what I was told). SO - over all we are VERY thankful Alayna is going to be fine :) She's still wobbling around and so far it's not really looking any better but I have to be patient...it won't be better overnight. She really doesn't seem bothered by it and continues to play like she did before. Not much is going to slow her down!

Getting ready to have the blood work done. She really HATES the doctor's office...not a fan of even getting things "checked" much less the needle business.