Week 1 is almost done!

This week has certainly had it's ups and downs!
The negatives: Aiden hates getting the cast on in the morning, and has now managed to slip it off 3 times. An above the elbow cast, which should be physically impossible to do! He begs me at random times to take it off, and it is heartbreaking watching him cry when he can't pick something up with is right hand. That poor hand has worked more in the last week than his entire life combined! On Saturday, he was playing outside during a barbeque - and dipped the cast in a mud puddle. It took from Saturday afternoon until Sunday night to dry! It did some damage, but hopefully I dried it in time and it will not actually fall apart! Of course, that means that today is 20x harder to get him to keep the cast on after such a long break! When it comes off at night, he swings his left arm around and shouts "it's free! my arm can breath!". Eating has been a bit of a challenging mess! I have tried to stick to finger foods as much as possible since he still can't grip a fork or spoon and ends up using his whole hand anyways! By the way - for anyone planning on doing this therapy in the future - stay away from pancakes and syrup in the beginning! My mom took us out to eat, and Aiden ordered breakfast for dinner. He gave up trying to get the super fluffy pancakes and just grabbed a fistful - the dipped the whole fist into the syrup. It was a mess that I wish I had brought my camera for! And the biggest, messiest part of the whole thing... using the toilet! Boys have to aim, and it requires a dexterity that you don't think about until they have to use a hand with no muscle control. Thank goodness we have lots of soap for handwashing and plenty of clorox wipes!!!
The positives: He is using his hand so much! I cannot believe how good he is doing! Although I think we still have a long ways to go with finger control - he still cannot move any of his fingers independantly, but I am confident that he will get there. Once his cast is actually on, he asks for a break from it less and less - in fact one night before bed he actually asked if he could sleep with it because it felt funny to have it off!
Tomorrow is his first session of therapy with the cast, so I hope that Jennifer sees as much progress as I have!