My son's smile/cleft lip

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I have written about this before but it has been a long time. Some people know that my son was born with a cleft lip. Yesterday marked 8 years since his surgery. I have had a lot of people ask me questions over the years. I even wrote his story for a book to try and help others going through it. My son was super fortunate in that he only had a cleft lip and not the palate too. The lip is much easier to repair (for lack of a better word) than the palate. My son had what is known as an incomplete unilateral cleft lip. That basically means his lip wasn't complete because it didn't go up into his nose. Unilateral means it was only one side. When I was going through my journey I was looking for information to know what to expect when he had his surgery only no one could fully tell me. I eventually had my cousin talk to me about it since one of her daughters had almost the exact same thing as my son. It turns out my son's cleft lip was genetic, it's not always but in my case it was. I originally just thought it was only my son and my cousin's daughter but then found out there was another cousin's child that was born with a cleft lip. I ran into them all at the cleft clinic one year. I later figured out that all of them were the grandchild of a twin. My grandma had three sets of twins that survived. My dad was a twin (his twin brother drowned years ago), then the other two were grandchildren of the same set of twins. I am unsure if this is a coincidence or not. Anyway, I just remember feeling relieved to be able to talk to someone about what was to come. I was so scared. I felt my son was perfect as is but the world is cruel and they wouldn't see him the same way I did. I thought his wide smile was absolutely perfect. I thought he was perfect. I wasn't looking forward to his surgery. Nothing hurts more than seeing your child scared and not knowing what is going on. I remember the way they took him from me and how he was reaching for me scared and crying. It hurt seeing him scared. Everyone assured me he would be fine but even knowing this it hurts seeing your baby scared and in pain. I remember seeing him right after surgery and how he looked like a little kitty cat with the tape on his face. He looked up at me and attempted to smile but couldn't. It hurt so much. My son was a trooper though, he hardly cried except for the first few minutes after surgery and the first few minutes before. When we got up to his room I remember they told me he would probably sleep a lot due to the meds but he didn't. He fought sleep. The nurses all loved him because he was such a content baby. We had a hard time trying to feed him because he couldn't have a bottle we eventually syringe fed him because he was used to it since he got a lot of ear infections so he got medicine a lot. He had splints on his arms to keep him from messing with his face. I remember just holding him and looking down into his sweet little face and then I heard for the first time ever "mama". He looked right at me and said it and attempted to smile again and couldn't. I remember thinking the two weeks he had to keep the splints on and be syringe fed would take forever and at the time they did but now my son is eight so it went by pretty quickly. My son has a slight scar on his lip and a little extra skin on his lip for his lip to stretch as he grows. Almost no one knows he had a cleft lip because he doesn't look like it. I didn't know he was going to be born with a cleft although later looking at his 3D ultrasound picture you could see it but no one was looking for it. When he was born they told me he had a slight cleft and I didn't know what they were talking about I knew almost nothing about clefts at the time it was all so new and scary and I was terrified but then they put him in my arms and I looked down at his face and none of it seemed to matter anymore. I knew we'd figure it out that everything would be ok. He had some trouble eating at first he could suck but he would get in too much air so I had to hold his lip together to keep him from getting too much air. I remember the months after hearing kids ask their parents what was wrong with him or having people rudely stare at him. I hate the term repair or fix when it comes to his lip despite sometimes using them myself because I can't think of a better word. To me he was always perfect. I grieved the loss of his wide smile but welcomed his new smile and learned to fall in love with it too. Looking through pictures all I can see is he has the best smile before and after his surgery. My son's smile is one of the things I love most about him. He had a preschool teacher that told me that his smile was by far one of the best smiles she's seen. It made me smile because as his mom I feel that way every time I see it. My son's smile is what keeps me going on the worst of days. His smile has been and always will be perfect. I'm glad he had the surgery because as I said the world can be a cruel place and people sometimes fail to see things the same way I do. My son has always been beautiful and always will be because of who he is. It has been eight years and while no one can really tell he had a cleft except those who have had experience with them I know it was there and sometimes miss it but also love him how he is now. He will forever be my smiley boy. Cleft or no cleft. My son is extremely fortunate to have only needed one surgery because there are many children who need a lot of them due to also having a cleft palate. My son will hopefully only ever need one unless there is an issue with his lip not stretching the way it needs to.