The cast comes off

The 3 1/2 weeks was up and it was time to get Ethan's second cast off.  Courtney had an early out day so she was able to go along.  We checked Ethan out early and drove to the dr's office.  Once again Jenny was there to take care of us.  She had Ethan sit on the table and got the saw out to cut the cast off.  It took a while but they got it off ok.  Ethan was really nervous that his ankle would hurt like his knee had but it wasn't too bad.

Jenny had him lay down on the table and I cleaned between his toes for him.  It was pretty gross but someone needed to do it.  I couldn't get over how hairy his leg was!  He kept asking me to itch his foot and I tried but apparently I didn't scratch him hard enough so he took over and did it himself.  You can see how he had scratched off the top of his foot because it's all red in the picture below.

They took Ethan for another xray to see how the break has been healing.  It is healing pretty well.  He has a slight lump on his shin from where it is healing and he still has the blue pen "X" where the EMTs marked the location of the break, but it is looking good.

After the xrays, Ethan sat in a chair to wait for the doctor to let him know what they wanted to do now.  He spent his time scratching off the dead, dry skin from his leg and foot.  It was pretty gross to watch the skin flake off but Ethan loved the way it felt.

After a scratching fit, Ethan moved his heel and found that he had left a flaky skin footprint.  It was so gross that I just had to document it.

You can see the slight "X" that marks his break.

We didn't get to see the doctor but instead saw his PA.  He looked at the xray and said that Ethan still needs to wear a boot for support for another 3 weeks.  This wasn't what we wanted to hear at all.  We were prepared with his tennis shoe so he could walk out on his own.  Ethan had been walking in his cast for 4-5 days so we figured it was healed enough that he would be fine.  But the doctor didn't want to take the chance.  They fitted Ethan with a boot and told him to take it easy on his foot for a while.  They said to lean on his crutches for a few days until he got used to walking.  But once we were out of the office, Ethan handed me his crutches and just started walking.

He said it felt fine for a while but then it started to ache.  The boot had some extra padding that was squeezing his foot and causing some discomfort.  Jenny came over the next day and took it out and helped Ethan learn to adjust it a little better.  She gave him a paper with all kinds of stretches to do so his heel would feel better.  He was really disappointed to still be in a boot and I don't blame him at all.

We have another appointment in 3 weeks to have more xrays and see how things are going.  We are hopeful that he will walk out in a tennis shoe after that appointment.