by Kelly Wilbanks posted in Parenting

My youngest daughter, born this February, came into this world with zero complications. A birth defect was the last thing on our minds. My husband caught her as she emerged after one long, slow push. He placed her on my chest just as snow began to softly fall, coating the buildings around us in a layer of fresh, white, icy newness.
She spent the first hour or so being held by me and her father. We gushed over her compact size, her cute little ears, and her immediate attempts to nurse. We'd done it. By the grace of God and all things holy we'd made another little human being; sweet, scrumptious, beautiful, and whole.

We all dozed and doted on each other until it was interrupted by Annie's first check-up. By that time we were eager to find out how her weight and height compared to her sisters. It was during that examination that the nurse first noticed that Annie's foot had some irregularities. It might be hard to tell in this picture, but her left three middle toes are shorter than the ones on her right foot. The nail is also not growing on top; it's growing on the edge of her toe. Her middle toe was also sporting a scab my husband began affectionately calling her talon. It lasted until month 4 and now we kind of have a nail growing there.

I held off for about four hours before I tried researching her symptoms online. Annie's birth defect wasn't really searchable though. She didn't have a recognized condition. Thankfully her ma...