Here he is while waiting for surgery. You'd have to know that his cyst was there, on his right shoulder at the base of his neck.
He fought the different prods and monitors, and eventually modeled the scrubs for us.
One last smiling shot before he headed back. He woke up grumpy and cried off an on until we got him out the door. Twenty minutes later he was throwing his new stuffed panda around the car, and he hasn't turned back.
Unfortunately 10 days later, this is what he looks like (picture was taken on Monday, but it's still the same). Joshua couldn't care less that he has a baseball sized lump on his shoulder. His surgeon isn't concerned. Today we took him to get a pediatrician to check it out, and we ended up at Fairfax Hospital getting an ultrasound of it, still his surgeon doesn't care. I go between ok with it and then staring at it or poking it. I'm trying to trust the surgeon, but am not sure she really gets what it looks like and what it's doing.
Tonight we took him out in a tank top, not thinking about his lump sticking out. I got several people looking at it, but very few were willing to ask about it. I guess that's what life is like when you have any type of physical deformity. I did want to say, "it's ok to ask ... no he didn't have a big lump like that 2 weeks ago."
Woah! That is big. I'll pray for him. I'm sure it's ok if the doc says it is, though. One of the biggest adjustments coming back to the U.S. is how over-sensitive people are. One of the first things I taught Archie to say to people in China was "I'm cross-eyed and they're fixing it" 'cause everybody always asked. Didn't seem to cause him any adjustment problems. I liked the openness.
ReplyDeletehey abi! sorry about the lil' guy's swelling and surgery. i hope all is well otherwise with you guys! i wanted to let you know that i had wrist surgery a year and a half ago and while it did not swell quite like that, it did take many weeks for it to go all the way down. so don't get too discouraged if the surgeon is ok with it. by all means seek a second opinion if you feel the need, but do know that swelling can take a long, crazy time to go down after surgeries! sending hugs your way :) - ashley (from hillcrest)
ReplyDeleteoh my goodness he looks so cute in his scrubs (you too) The ones I got for Eli when he was in the hospital here were not as pretty!
ReplyDeletepraying for wisdom for you and the mass!!!