Radioulnar Synostosis.....all the cool kids have it

Earlier this year, Halle's gymnastics teacher came to us and asked if she had ever broken either of her arms before. They were working on pulling themselves up on the bar and Halle couldn't grip that way. I wondered briefly, if my parenting skills were that bad that I didn't even notice that my daughter had broken her arms thus far in her short 3 1/2 years here on this earth. I racked my brain and couldn't come up with anything so we took her in to see our pediatrician to see what was going on. They took x-rays and told us to go ahead and make an appointment with a pediatric orthopaedic specialist for further counsel on her condition. There was a long wait to get in to see the right doctor so for the last few months, we have been paying extra attention to Halle's arm movement issues. Halle has gotten used to showing everyone her "special" arms and always says, "This one works and this one doesn't" when demonstrating her lack of range of motion.

Today, we finally had her appointment and became a bit more informed with what she's got going on. The diagnosis was "radioulnar synostosis" which means her radius and ulna are fused together at the elbow joint in both arms. This results in a limited ability to supinate her hands, the left more so than the right in her case. The doctors recommended that we do nothing at this point since it is a very serious surgery without many guarantees for increased ROM. They told us that she will live a normal life,(Phew!) and just compensate by figuring out different ways to do things. When I got home I had to go search online to see if I could find anything else out about our little diagnosis which is usually a very bad idea because there is some scary info out there. All I could find were references to kids who had Fetal Alcohol Syndrome and then a few entries under "Human Malformations and Anomalies". Since I did try to lay off on the drinking during her pregnancy and she is pretty normal-looking, (pretty darn cute actually)....... We have just tried to think up all the things she will be doing with her own sense of style.

*Pull-ups in gym class

*Receive a "five" as in "gimme five"

*Hold hands with boyfriends

*Fast-pitch softball

*Receive large amounts of change

*Do the "walk like an egyptian" dance move

*Scratch the middle part of her back

*Parallel bars in gymnastics

*Play the cello, violin, or any other stringed instrument

*Drink water from a cupped hand

*Bicep curls

All in all, we think she is going to be just fine, a bit quirky maybe, but fine nonetheless.