4/07/13 - Doctor Kimble

It's hard to believe, but it's been almost three months since Ellie's lip repair. The scars are healing, the stitches are finally gone, and the swelling is slowly going down. But of course now that that hurdle has been successfully jumped, it's time to start thinking about the next one.

Our appointment with doctor Kimble was one of the only ones I was looking forward to. I wanted his opinion on the swelling between Ellie's lip and gum, and to find out more about the next step - the palate repair.

As usual for a trip to Hobart our day started ridiculously early, but at least this time I hadn't been up all night with a newborn! Ellie is taking longer before feeds now so we made it further before we needed to stop and we actually made it to Hobart with a bit of time up our sleeves.

When we arrived at doctor Kimble's private rooms at the Hobart Private Hospital the waiting room was full, and the receptionist said there would be quite a wait. We've waited over three hours before to see him in the public clinic, so I was a little bit anxious hearing that. He clearly runs his private clinic a lot better than the public one though, and we were taken through only half an hour late.

One of the things that I love about doctor Kimble is they way he always says hello to Ellie before he greets us. Her little face lit up when he spoke to her, and I get the feeling she is going to really trust him as she grows up. It's nice to see him care just that little bit. He also addresses us by name, and remembers what we're there for.

In his office he took a look at Ellie's swelling and said that he wasn't worried. I know that we'd been told that by doctor naiker, but I finally relaxed after hearing her surgeon confirm that it would go down by itself eventually. 

After that it was a simple matter of filling out the admission forms for her palate repair and we were on our way. He reiterated that with Ellie's cleft being so severe the repair would be more difficult, and explained that it will most likely take two operations to get the cleft completely closed. So we will go in September for her first repair and the second will be within six months after that.

After we left we called in to Ronald McDonald House to say hello to the ladies and to feed Ellie, and then we hit the road again for the long drive back. I'm starting to think we should just move to Hobart and save ourselves all this travel!