Foot Surgery

Today was an extremely hard day for Tyler.  His surgery was put off until 1:00 in the afternoon.  He is eating so little anyway that by the time surgery came around, he was tremendously hungry, thirsty and nervous.  Tyler has lost so much weight already.  It becomes challenging to get the calories he needs when everything you eat has to be pureed.  They also decreased his pain medication in anticipation of the surgery so he was in intense pain this morning as well.   He was feeling pretty downtrodden before surgery. 

The surgeon said the surgery went “okay”.    He did a bone graft by taking bone from Tyler’s shin.  He wasn't expecting to have to do a graft.  He went in the shin through one of Tyler’s large cuts and just made it a little bit bigger.  The surgeon said there was one large piece of heel that was just big enough to put the screws in.  There were at least 30 pieces floating around.  He was able to put many of the pieces together, but there are still fragments floating around.  Time will tell if those pieces will fuse to other bone.  The most immediate concern is the lack of circulation to his foot which in turn makes the rate of infection increase.  Because his foot was so damaged and due to the lack of blood flow, infection will be a grave concern for the next 3 months.  He will not be able to put any weight on that foot for 10 weeks.  The surgeon said we need to hope that a lot of things fall in place for this surgery to be successful.   As a family, we know that miracles happen.  We have witnessed an outpouring of God’s love already.  “But behold, I will show unto you a God of miracles, even the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob; and it is that same God who created the heavens and the earth, and all things that in them are.” 

We have peace by knowing that Tyler has a big brother that suffered all that we might live.  He knows everything that Tyler is going through and can give him the comfort he needs.  We also attest that our Heavenly Father can help this extreme trial make Tyler stronger.  We have so much to be grateful for this Thanksgiving Eve, but we are also praying that tomorrow will be a little bit brighter for our sweet Tyler.