Yup, it is broken. Very, very broken.

Went to the orthopedic clinic today and confirmed that Wheeler does indeed have a broken arm, a very broken arm to be exact. And I don't have a broken arm. I know this because when he gets an x-ray, I get an x-ray. I have to hold him up! Actually, I wasn't on the film and got to wear a nifty lead vest, but it reminds me of when he is hospitalized ... he when is hospitalized, so am I. All those who deal with high level quadness know exactly what I mean. 

He has an oblique fracuture of the left humerus - it is a diagonal break, it is completely in two pieces and then just for fun, dislocated too. The treatment is just to wait for it to heal itself. They put him in a "functional brace", which is just a hard piece of plastic that protects the upper arm. The problem is that regular people can feel when the hard brace is pinching just a little wrong and can shift around. He can't feel it and so I'm terrified that his skin will pinch and cause a nasty pressure sore, which would truly be disastrous. 

I can't dress him because to dress him I have to roll him side to side to dress him, so I went and bought a bunch of sweat pants to slide - gently - onto him. I can't use our overhead lift to move him because of his arm, and so we have to do stand and pivot transfers, which is a fancy way of saying picking him up by brute force. Can't shower him, can't can't can't.... 

I'm sure this will seem more manageable in the morning, but I am truly getting overwhelmed. And panicky. Then I feel guilty on top of it all because he is the one with the broken arm for goodness sake. But it does affect me - alot - and I am trying to remember that its ok for me to feel overwhelmed too. Right? Something about being at the clinic, seeing the actual xray, hearing that it will take at least 8 weeks to heal under the best of circumstances (e.g. he wasn't a holey boned quad and had something crazy like, say, senasation) made it just all come crashing down on me. :(

And just to top it all off, the very expensive Lionel train that we bought for Offspring has a bad transformer. So I have to box it up, mail it back, etc etc. That just seems insurmountable. 

Things will seem better in the morning. 

Right? 

Sigh.

Ho ho ho, merry Christmas 2007

Merry Christmas!

Here is the giant mistletoe growing in our front yard tree.


When the big day arrived yesterday, we kicked into high gear. We had our 3-decade (really) tradition and had soups at my parent's house. Then we went to church, and on the way home from church, Offspring saw Santa!!! It was overcast and cloudy, but there was a huge bright big moon that lit up the sky. As a result, Offspring suddenly spied Rudolph's nose bright against the sky. He went bonkers, absolutely nuts - he screamed to my dad "GRAMPA!!! DRIVE FASTER GRAMPA!! SPEEEEEEEEED! I DON'T CARE IF YOU GET A TICKET, SPEED GRAMPA, SPEED!!!!". He almost launched himself out of the window of the car despite being buckled into a car seat. When we got to the driveway of the house, he burst out of the car and flew into the house where Santa had brought all of us some amazing gifts.

First, Santa brought Offspring his much (much!!) coveted Lego Mars Mission Command base.


Next, Santa-blogauthors-parents brought Wheeler a Panasonic 42 inch plasma 1080p television (<-- Wheeler had to feed me this information, its just a really cool TV to me). Its freakin' awesome. He has been talking about getting one of these TVs for months and months and months. It had actually been making me nutso, 'cause as far as I'm concerned, two HD televisions were just fine. Particularly since the one in the living room is turned on every few months at best. But he ha been going on and on- blah blah blah blah blah about a new TV. In fact, we were at Sears a couple of days ago and he spent the entire time in the TV section. I browsed everything else in the store, sheets, knick knacks, kids clothes, appliances, even tools!, bored to tears when I returned to find him still drooling over the televisions. Well, now those days are over because we have a (insert above) television in our bedroom. And I have to admit that he was right, it is freakin' awesome.

But perhaps the most exciting event of the day was the present that Santa brought early to Wheeler. As-seen-on-Tv-but-not-available-in-stores ....

a broken arm!!

Yes, you heard that right, a broken arm - for the low, low price of FREE!, delivered straight to your bedroom. Never before available, but in a special offering only for quadriplegics with weak bones due to 20 years of non-weight-bearing activity.

Yup, a broken arm.

Wheeler was being ranged, which is to say, stretched around so that his muscles stay supple and flexible since he can't do it himself. The person who was ranging him had his arm stretched over his head when suddenly there was a very loud CRACK! She came out to fetch me to check it out. I came in and it was crunchy and crackling when moving it around. And the arm had already started swelling. Within 30 minutes his upper arm was swelled such that it looked like a softball under his skin. So, now he is in a sling and gulgping ibuprofen. And I can't figure out how to get him up because I can't roll him side to side to get his pants on since I would roll him right onto that arm. What was it I was saying about drawing the short stick in life?!! In the spirit of our usual you-gotta-laugh-or-you'll-cry we know refer to this event as "The Christmas Crack".

Despite that, we had a great, great Christmas. I got brave and we made a gingerbread house. I used gluten free flour and damn if it wasn't good. As in actually good, not just a reasonable facsimile of something good.

Even Dog got into the spirit of the holiday ...