We were in Lakeway at Chad's sister's house and we walked down to the park. Brooks loves trying to be "big" like his cousins, so of course he wanted to try the monkey bars. We saw him climbing the stairs and Chad went over to help him. He hung on to the bars for a few seconds and then let go. Chad grabbed his hand to support him, but Brooks slipped a bit, and ultimately just fell wrong. The ground under him was slightly slanted and he hit the ground "just right". He started crying immediately, and it was a very unfamiliar cry. I held him and went to sit on the bench. He started grabbing at his shoe like he desperately wanted it off of his foot. I took his shoe off and he started grabbing his toes. I thought maybe he broke a toe or something. We took him back to the house and put some ice on it. The whole time he was whimpering and grabbing his foot. All he wanted to do was be held. We tried to get him to stand and he wouldn't put any pressure on his leg. All these symptoms combined led us to Emergency Care. We were the only ones there so we got right in. The doctor felt around and predicted a sprang but called for x-rays to be sure. I couldn't go in the x-ray room since I'm pregnant, so I was forced to sit outside and listen to my baby cry while they had to twist and turn his leg for pictures. I cried too. The doctor came back and told us that Brooks had a spiral fracture on his tibia.
Definition: A spiral fracture (a.k.a. torsion fracture) is a bone fracture resulting from the affected bone being twisted apart. The spiral fracture will look like a corkscrew type which runs parallel with the axis of the broken bone. Spiral fractures seldom occur when the person is not moving.
For children, mishaps such as falling down the stairs or sports injuries may cause a spiral fracture.
They put a splint on him and told us to keep him off his feet until we could get a cast on:
Birdie was in town so she came by on Monday to stay with Brooks and keep him entertained. She came over with 3 new movies and a Magnadoodle:
We got in to see the Orthopedic Surgeon Monday afternoon to get a cast on Brooks' leg. The doctor did more x-rays to get a closer look, and confirmed what the original doctor had said...Spiral Fracture. He mentioned that if we lived on an island somewhere Brooks would just limp around for a while and the bone would just heal. But since we live in the United States a cast was the plan. Brooks did great while they put the cast on - we borrowed a friend's itouch to keep him busy. They did have to put the cast past his knee so that his knee wouldn't rotate and irritate the fracture. Kind of a bummer. But Brooks came home and felt well enough to roll around on the ground with Daddy:
He was even back to his silly-self:
Brooks showing off his "big owie":
The doctor said that he should only need the cast for 3 weeks. Hopefully Brooks will learn to get around in that time. Today he crawled around a lot, and tonight we practiced walking while holding mommy or daddy's hand. He's being such a trooper! He does get frustrated some times, but overall he is doing well.
