Since Jane's birth, our attitude has been to treat her like any other baby because she is like any other baby. Because of this, we seldom mention Jane's differences. However, I recently realized that much of our family and many of our closest friends are unaware of the details of why Jane's arm is the way it is and how it affects (or doesn't affect) her life. So I thought I would dedicate a blog post to a short explanation.
Two weeks before Christmas, Jane came into our lives amid worries about her heart. After she was born, it became clear that her heart was perfectly healthy. However, there was something else that we were not expecting. Jane was born without a left hand and the lower portion of her left forearm. After a thorough examination, several doctors concurred that Jane had either lost or never developed a left hand due to
amniotic banding, a rare condition in which fibrous bands that were once part of the amniotic sac entrap a portion of the baby's body. The presence of these bands is not common and is not due to any factor either on the part of the baby or the part of the mother. It is a random occurrence that we have since learned causes many pregnancies to end in miscarriage. Because of this, we are grateful that Jane lost only a hand.
That is pretty much the extent of the information we have learned about why Jane doesn't have a left hand. We aren't interested in pursuing any more of the why because it doesn't matter. Here is what does matter: Despite her missing hand, Jane has been overwhelmingly normal and we are delighted to have her in our family. We don't make a big deal about her hand because we don't want it to define her. Although it will always be the first thing someone will notice about her, we hope that as people get to know her, they will forget about her hand as we do for long periods of time.
We are currently looking into starting physical therapy and want to keep Jane's options open when it comes to prosthetic devices. There are some amazing devices on the market such as the
i-limb that we hope Jane will be able to use in the future if she wishes. However, if Jane decides she doesn't want a prosthetic hand, we will be completely accepting of that as well. Many parents of children with similar challenges have found children's prosthetics to impede, rather than encourage, development. For that reason, we will probably be holding off on prosthetics for a while. Although we may change our minds when we meet with the prosthetist for the first time next week.
For now, Jane is doing well using her left forearm as she would a hand. She grasps objects between her right hand and left forearm and she has started to hold objects in the crook of her left arm. In every other respect, she is just like any other child. She has learned to roll over and can sit for short periods, just as Emily could when she was Jane's age. Her lack of a hand has not slowed her development at all thus far. We do not consider Jane to be handicapped or a special needs child. She does not function much differently than any baby her age.
We know that Jane was sent to our family as a blessing to us as well as to her. She has already taught us that different can be wonderful and that Heavenly Father knows what He is doing. Although the doctors considered the loss of Jane's hand to be a "random" event we know that nothing is random in Heavenly Father's plan for us. We love Jane and know that our family would not be complete without her.
