My baby is growing!

Well my baby continues learning to "master" her walking skills. It's really neat to see her walking in her cruiser brace. We are still waiting for her doctor's appointment which is coming up in a couple of weeks. Hopefully we will get good news at that point. Please remember if you ever come across anyone that has a baby with this problem to let me know or give them this address. I would love to encourage any family that has to go through what we've been through in the last year. Have a wonderful spring!

My baby is trying to walk!

I am so excited! In the last two weeks, my baby has started trying to walk. Her legs are still weak so she is quite clumsy. We have an appointment in about three weeks to take her back for x-rays. I hope this time we will get good news and maybe she will only have to use the brace to sleep in.

We took her to Duke for a second opinion in January and the doctor there said she would only make her wear it at night-so she stays out of the brace a little more these days. I will give you an update as soon as we go back to the doctor.

We are all very excited about the warm weather and are looking forward to enjoying some outside time. I hope all you do as well. Take care.

My Hip Baby's progress

Well, after many months of being in a spica cast and then a pavlik harness we moved on to a cruiser brace which has not been all that bad. She's just so active now that she can undo the brace herself. It's quite a challenge keeping her in it. At least she keeps it on when she sleeps.

When we found out about her hip dysplasia, I started looking everywhere on the internet for information. We ran into many bumps in the road, especially when she was in the cast. She wouldn't fit in her car seat, couldn't wear certain clothes, and forget all about shoes--so we had to be really creative.

If you are interested in knowing more about hip dysplasia, this is a really good website to see lots of stories and pictures of babies (and toddlers) with this problem.

Here's a picture of my baby on her first birthday.

Introducing------the Hip Nana!

While no doctor actually heard the "click" that you read about, a very GOOD nurse heard something the day our baby was born. So, at her 6-week visit (April 2008), the pediatrician decided to have a "routine" ultrasound done just to be sure and to everyone's surprise, they discovered that our baby had bilateral hip dysplasia. What in the world was that? Well now almost a year later, I'm not an expert, but I can promise you I know a lot more than I did. Within a week our baby had to go to the hospital and be fitted in a Spica cast because a Pavlik harness would not correct her problem. Hip dysplasia is not uncommon, however bilateral (both hips) hip dysplasia is! What an eventful year we had ahead of us!