pins

Pony, I completely get what you’re saying; actually it’s a question we get a lot – did the break affect his overall height (probably, because it affected his growth plate), will one leg end up being shorter (not expected at his age since he’s still growing), and why didn’t they set it in pins (usually done with children over the age of 6 or over 100 pounds).

The reason it looks shorter is because he still has some stiffness in it, particularly first thing in the morning (just like adults when your joints feel swollen and sore after a long run the day before), as well as late in the evening after he’s had a lot of activity.

Stiffness in joints is caused by inactivity, and although for most of us that’s after the course of 8 hours’ sleep, in his case he still has some stiffness from over 2 months of not moving any of those joints – not just the femur that he broke, but that whole thing of the hip bone’s connected to the thigh bone, the thigh bone’s connected to the knee bone, etc.

That children’s song really has some basis behind it – they are all connected, and since all of the bones were immobilized by the spica cast (sacrum – hip, femur – thigh, patella – knee, tibula, fibula – lower leg bones) all the surrounding joints are still stiff, not just the joints surrounding the broken bone.

Sometimes I forget who I’ve told what to, but we were told to expect the recovery to be roughly double the weeks he was in a cast; so it realistically may be mid-August or so before there’s not the noticeable limp. I should know a lot more after he has his follow-up appointment this week though.

Tags: spica cast