A good news post

There is also good news. I will save the best for last.

The tiles have arrived! Phoning twice a day for a solid week clearly paid off. Squeaky wheel and all that.

Our new stove arrived! The first night I baked a casserole in it and the oven got so incredibly hot that I almost singed my eyebrows off when I reached in to remove it. I had become used to a lukewarm oven and forgot what heat feels like. So what I'm trying to say is I no longer feel like sticking my head in an oven, ha, ha.

I have a powerful new laptop! I purchased a new laptop through my employer's purchase program, so I got a bit of a deal. Now we need to get busy and load the various software we'll need for home-schooling.

And now for something quite exciting . . . I got to observe a cleft lip repair at the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO)! Dr. Duncan, a well-respected pediatric plastic surgeon, graciously agreed to let me watch the two-hour surgery. There is a fabulous nurse, Sue Hunt, who is the backbone of the Cleft Palate Team at CHEO, and she got me into the OR. They gave me scrubs to put on and a mask (which I put on backwards, I felt lik a dork when one of the nurses had to fix it). The morning of the surgery I was up by 5:30am to get to the hospital very early as they start right away. Dr. Duncan even brought in one of her massive textbooks to show me the procedure she was using. It was fascinating. She narrated everything she was doing and why, so I certainly learned a great deal. I wanted to see this as I hope to volunteer with Operation Smile in either Africa or South-East Asia during our year away.

I have to say I found it tiring to stand in one spot for two hours and I was not even doing anything with my hands. I don't think I could ever be a surgeon. I also could not really differentiate what I was seeing. For example, the surgeon would point out the obicularis oris muscle that she was attaching but it looked nothing like pictures of muscle fibers in an anatomy book. The little baby was 3 months old, a very gorgeous chunky little fellow. I met his parents and you could feel how concerned they were about everything. The lip surgery went well and he will probably have his cleft palate repaired around age one year. It's hard to imagine that in many developing countries these kids grow up into adults (well, the lucky ones actually do get to grow up) with these gaping clefts unrepaired.

One amazing coincidence occurred in the Operating Room. The anesthetist actually knows my sister Lori - they went to med school together in Saskatchewan. I forget exactly how we figured this out. I think someone mentioned Sask., so I mentioned I grew up there which led the ansthetist to comment she went to med school there, to which I added "so did my sister", etc. etc. Lori, if you're reading this, Dr. Marion Gould says hi!



I also spent some time observing in the various Cleft Palate Clinics, including speech pathology of course (thank you Sussie!) as well as the dental clinic, ENT and audiology. Thanks CHEO for some great PD!