The Broken Arm In Pictures and Emails

To have all our visual memories of The Monkey Broken Arm Incident in one place, here are some more photos of the event.

Here are the series of emails I shared with family and friends to keep them updated:

1) Feb. 1: It’s a break!

2) Feb. 3: Zoe broke her arm while we arm while we were in Florida, so I’m taking her to get a cast put on this morning.

3) Feb. 3 to Gina: The tough thing was, Zoe fell off a merry-go-round at the playground at the rental house and broke her arm. Of course, we didn’t know it was broken, but went ahead and assumed it was. So, we packed up as quickly as we could and drove up to Matt and April’s to have her looked at up there. She wasn’t in much pain if the arm was immobilized, and we iced it all the way there. The urgent care center put a splint on it, and we had an appointment with the ortho in Reston this morning. He put a cast on it, and we go back in a week for another x-ray to see how it is healing. Cast from armpit to fingers for at least 6 weeks.

I’m so thankful it happened on our last day to Disney, and I trust that in about 5 years this will be a great family story. For now, she’s still very sad about it, but isn’t in pain, for which I’m grateful.

4) Feb. 8: L.M. wrote last night to ask about Zoe, so I thought I’d update everyone all at once.

Yesterday was really a turning point day. She’s still very careful of the arm, and the cast still feels
very heavy, but as I tucked her into bed last night she said it doesn’t feel like it’s broken any
more, and she showed me how she can move the arm around much more easily than she had
been able to.

She hasn’t asked for any pain relief since Sunday, which seems like another good indicator.

We’ll go on Friday morning to have an x-ray taken, and that will hopefully confirm her feeling
that all is going well in healing.

Thanks for the thoughts and prayers. She has really been amazing through the whole process.

5) Feb. 8 to Aunt Liz: She flew off the merry-go-round at the subdivision of the house we rented down at Disney. It was the last morning of being able to go to Disney, so if it had to happen, it was the best timing possible. She had nearly the whole time for fun.

She broke both bones in her right arm, at the half-way point of the lower arm. Full arm cast for at least 6 weeks, x-rays once a week for the first two weeks, then possibly not for a couple weeks if all is going well. They may re-cast at some point partway through.

We’re using the same group of docs that helped with Maya’s break, and the doc we got is great.

Zoe can laugh about it now, which is a wonderful thing.

Other than that, we had a fantastic time in Florida.

6) Feb. 13 to Jenny: Did I tell you Zoe broke her right arm our last day at Disney? She flew off a merry-go-round at the playground by the house we rented. She’s doing great with it now. She’ll have had the cast for two weeks this Friday, and they will probably give her a new cast when we go in for x-rays then. This one will have gotten too loose. Then at least 4 more weeks in the cast.

7) No more updates via email after this point, but the cast did eventually come off. She was in a soft brace for 2 weeks after that, though she only ended up wearing it for 2 days. Back on the scooter and bike a week later, and now, as I write this on May 28, the “Arm Incident” is fading into the family stream of memory, except that every time someone says, “Disney was great,” someone else will chime in with, “Except when Zoe broke her arm.