My children are BEAUTIFUL. God made every one of their fingers and toes PERFECT. Will the world see it this way? Not always, but we know God designed each and every one of us for His glory and loves us just as we are.
Imagine a boy from China thinking he was abandoned because of a deformed thumb.
Imagine living your whole life with a dysfunctional thumb, one that flopped about, out of your control.
Imagine being ripped from the only country and home you have ever know to be whisk off to a new country with a new language, new family, new home, and new friends.
Imagine being told that something that has always been a part of you is going to be removed, yes, to make your life and functionality improved, but still . . .
Imagine thinking that they were just going to cut off that floppy thumb without any pain killers. Horrifying thought for an 9 year old boy.
Imagine the relief when you learn they have “special sleep medicine”.
Our boy from China, though scared and unsure, held his head high and walked strong and sure into Scottish Rite Hospital in Dallas, TX to emerge 24 hours later with a new thumb. Well, he did have to wear a cast for six weeks, but you get the idea.
Anthony is full of life and energy with a flair for the dramatic! He is extremely intelligent and picked up English with incredible speed. He joined our family in January of 2013. Anthony has a deformity in his right arm and hand. He is missing the bones in his right thumb and the radius in his forearm is short causing his arm to slightly curve in. The amazing and renowned pediatric hand surgeons of Scottish Rite Hospital performed an amazing surgery on his hand. They removed his limp thumb and moved his index finger to the location of the thumb so that he now has an opposable digit. It is truly amazing! This is the only surgery they plan to perform. At some point as medicine advances, there is a possibility that they might be able to lengthen his arm as well.
Imagine a darling little 18 month girl bursting into your lives like a wildfire.
Imagine the parental distress over her precious misshapen fingers and toes.
Imagine the joy in learning that only a few short hours away from your home is someone who can help provide her with better functionality.
Imagine a sweet little girl who in and out of surgery without a single issue in less than a day.
Grace is a vivacious fun loving four year old who makes friends everywhere she goes. She joined our family in May of 2011. Grace has amniotic banding syndrome which led to deformities in her fingers and toes. She is missing her big toe on her left foot and the middle toes on her right foot are fused together as one. Additionally, her right foot is a slight club foot. Her index finger on her left hand is not properly formed and two of her middle fingers on her right hand are short. The same pediatric hand surgeons at Scottish Rite worked on her right hand to help her with movement and will possibly perform a follow up surgery on each hand in a few years. Grace wore her arm cast for a mere four week, and she never complained or once tried to pull it off. Keeping it dry was a bit of a challenge.
We also went through a series of casts and physical therapy on her right foot/leg to work on stretching the muscles and help the foot straighten. This is an ongoing process and we will most likely be refitting her for another AFO soon.
Our greatest struggles will be managing our children’s hurt feelings when other children ask them why their hands and feet are different. While the doctors performed wonderful work on their limbs, they will never look normal by the world’s standards. We know and will always communicate to them that God see them as perfect and beautiful, but that we live in a fallen world, so there will always be questions and looks. Haven’t we all experienced the cruelty of children at some point in our lives? Did any of us escape the teen years unscathed, without experiencing ridicule about something? Of course, this will break our hearts, but we pray that we will use these opportunities to point our precious babies to the One who loves them more than any of us could imagine or fathom.
