Medical happenings

The Aalderink household has been busy at the doctor lately. First Nathanael turned five, so he was due for a check-up. He was 44lbs and 44in! How neat is that? He is growing well physically and mentally. Though Laura found an area lacking in his schooling, he responded that the emergency number to call if Mommy got hurt really bad and couldn't get to the phone was 511. So a unit in school on safety is on the schedule. He's scheduled for his MRI of his ankles next week. His ankles have always looked a little off to Laura, and an orthopedic doctor confirms there is something there that must be fusing, but doesn't show up on x-ray. After the scan, we'll know better if he'll grow out of the crooked ankles (and thus some of his clumsiness) or if he needs surgery to correct a problem.



Forest also has been to the doctor a lot lately. He was working on the roof of a house, and caught a piece of roof sheathing from sliding down into a man below. However, when he caught it, it bent his elbow the wrong way and snapped his bicep tendon where it connects to his radius. So for 3 weeks now he's been without the full use of his left arm. After an MRI last week, he's now meeting with a new arm and hand specialist to discuss surgery and repair of his arm. You would be amazed to find out how often you use your bicep and don't even know it. Did you know it takes your bicep to turn a doorknob? Or that when you type on the keyboard you use your arm in such a way that a bicep is needed? He is not looking forward to the prospect of surgery, but looks forward to when he can use his arm fully again. The surgery is scheduled for the week after Thanksgiving, and he's looking at an imobilized arm right after--he'll be in a brace to keep his arm at 80 degrees. So for the next two weeks he is finishing up some projects around the house, because the doctor said he can't do anything to damage it worse.



Lastly, our little man, Josiah, has had a recent run-in with doctors. Our little quiet boy who doesn't make trouble had to visit the ER. Laura was carrying him into a friend's house and tripped over Talitha and the three of them tumbled to the floor. Laura tried to not drop Josiah, and succeeded in carrying him to the floor. But his head hit the baseboard at a corner of a wall. Mostly he seemed scared, not in pain. It goose-egged right away and was scraped a bit, but he seemed fine for the evening. After getting home and acting normal that night, Laura was woken late for his mid-night feeding. Usually he wakes Laura sometime between 3 and 4am, but yesterday morning he didn't wake up till 5am. Still not totally unusual, except for his spitting up. His crib had brown spit up, and Josiah was choking on more of it as she took him to the living room to nurse. Worse, he didn't want to nurse. Now if you look at our big 5-month-old boy, you know he likes his milk! So Laura packed up and went to the ER. There they did a CT of his head to check for bleeding, but didn't see anything wrong and after he nursed in the room, and spit up normal milk-colored spit-up, they sent him home and said if he seemed worse to return.



All day he was excessively sleepy, and Laura woke him every 4 hours to nurse-again odd for our big baby. However an hour after each feeding, he would spit-up wattery milk across the room--not normal. So back to the ER went Josiah and Mommy. All night they observed his vital signs and ran more tests. They repeated his head CT and found nothing wrong, then they did a CT on his belly, checking for posible internal bleeding. Those images came back normal as well. They ran every test they could think of and everything came back normal. It was just a long day and night of the ER. The doctors attribute his spitting up and sleepiness to a "minor" concussion from the fall. They do not forsee any lasting effects and feel confident he'll return to normal soon.

What a priviledge to live in a place where we have so many good doctors who know how to find out what is wrong with little bodies, and big ones! We are so thankful to God that none of our men are injured beyond repair. He truly is a merciful God!!