Keeping Up with the Kramers

A few weeks before Sam's second birthday, Heather and Sam were playing on the neighborhood playground together. Sam asked Heather to go down the slide with her, and Heather innocently agreed not knowing that this trip down the slide would result in Sam's first broken bone. Heather noticed at the end of the slide that his foot had gotten stuck up underneath him. He didn't cry very hard at all, but we knew something wasn't right when he refused to be put down and couldn't put any weight on his right foot.

We took him to the urgent care pediatrician who said a fracture was very unlikely at his age. She recommended ibuprofen and some rest, but to see an orthopedic specialist within 24 hours if he was still  limping. When Sam still couldn't put any weight on his leg the next morning, we decided not to wait any longer. We made an appointment that morning at the Arnold Palmer Hospital for Children Center for Orthopedics. There we learned that Sam had a hairline fracture in his right tibia. Our hearts were heavy for him when we learned that he would have to wear a cast for three weeks and stay off of his leg completely for the first four days. "Plenty of snacks and TV", the doctor ordered and Sam wasn't complaining a bit.

Baby's First Cast

After a few days of lounging, we could tell that Sam was ready to get up and go. He cautiously started putting weight on the leg and when he realized it didn't hurt anymore, he was off and running. He got around really well in that full-leg, red cast. He walked at first and then quickly learned to limp/run. He drew sympathetic looks every where we went. And people were always very surprised to see how little the cast slowed him down.



He had a great attitude about it the whole time. And when it was finally time to have the cast removed, he sat bravely while it was sawed off and promptly said "get down" when it was off. The staff had warned us that he might not want to walk on it for a couple of days, but he wanted to walk on it immediately.  His first few steps in the doctor's waiting room must have created a ticklish "pins and needles" sensation in his leg, because he giggled and looked up at Shawn saying, "it's sweepy, Daddy, it's sweepy"!  His sore knee and some numbness made it a bit difficult for him to get around at first, and he limped a little bit for a couple of weeks after the cast was removed, but now he's completely back to normal. Thank goodness!