Our Little Old Lady

Just Out Of Surgery

We're Going Home

Figuring out how to ride home was kind of tricky until we remembered that my front seats lay flat back

Our Little Old Lady

Image 1 from her surgery

Image 2 from her surgery

Yesterday my daughter had her surgery to repair her Discoid Meniscus and torn Meniscus. Monday night my husband and I decided to take the kids to our local fair because we knew Sami was going to be laid up for awhile. We had such a good time at the fair. My best friend and her family met us there so the kids got a once in a life time encounter. My friend use to me in the circus and is still friends with a lot of people in it so she brought us to her friends trailer and in the trailer was 2 - 2 week old tiger cubs. It was amazing!!!! 

Anyway, back to the surgery. The hospital had contacted me a few days before her surgery and asked if they could film her surgery because Discoid Meniscus is so rare plus they hadn't had anyone with Juvenile Arthritis on top of it. So over course I said yes, but what I didn't realize til the night before that they were going to film the family all day and us it for their telethon. So we checked into the hospital at 7:00am and by 7:30 they were bringing us back to pre op and that's where we were met by the cameras. I don't know if it was because of the cameras but it all seemed to move so fast.

First they brought Sami in a walker so they could teach her how to walk with it and still have her independence. Then another nurse came in to talk to us. Then then Anesthesiologist, shortly after him Dr. W came in. My husband had never met him so it was their first meeting, he went over Sami's surgery again so my husband would know everything. We talked about how at first he was just going to explore, then repair. Her MRI showed a small tear and really didn't show how bad her discoid meniscus was so he really didn't know what he was going into. Her MRI and X-Rays had both shown that she didn't have any damage to her joint from her arthritis but we said if he got in there and he saw some to go ahead and fix it. But before we knew it it was 8:30am and time for Sami to go back. Dr. W told us that her surgery should take about 1 1/2 hours. We walked Sami to the OR doors and when we got there they said to give her kisses and she had to lay down. So we kissed, said we'll see you in a little bit, I laid her down and she put her arms behind her head and said lets go. I laughed cause I thought she'd be scared but I guess it could be exciting to get your knee fixed and have a chance of being pain free.

About an 1 and 15 minutes later my husband and I were paged and the nurse was waiting for us. She said that the doctor was finishing up and he'd be out in just a few minutes to talk to us. We were brought into a room to wait. I swear that was the longest "few minutes" of my life. Dr. W finally came in and he was smiling. He told us he could see why Sami was in so much pain. Once he got in there he found that Sami did have joint damage, and her discoid meniscus was larger than what her MRI showed but he got her all fixed up. He made it into a disc shape again but it is still thicker than the other.

Sami spent about an hour in recovery and then they let us take our baby home. On the way out to my van my husband asked "How are we going to get her in the car with that brace on her leg." So we got to the van and I remembered the last time we went on vacation I was able to pull the seat all the way forward and then it laid back flat. So we laid it down and propped her leg up on it so she could still be in her car seat.

So we are home. About 8:00pm the medication Dr. W put straight into her knee wore off. My husband stayed up with her so I could get a little sleep. Then this afternoon her knee hurt so bad that even when she was sleeping she was crying so I called her doctor and he raised her pain meds. She's going to have 8 weeks of PT but we are so happy we did this. Her arthritis damage is fixed and her meniscus is fixed. He also said he didn't see and flaring so we think once she's all healed at least her right knee will be pain free.