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March 10, 2003
When it rains it pours!
We have now visited the ER 3 times in the last month and a half! It's a pretty sad thing when you check into the Emergency room and they pull out a thick file with your child's name on it!
This time, I got a call from Josh's daycare telling me that he had fallen in the yard while playing with another child. He fell on his chin and re-opened the previous wound. When they called I just started crying. I know that sounds silly, but I just thought this can't be happening to him again so soon. So, I pulled it together ran over to his daycare and picked him up. As before, he seemed fine. If I hadn't seen the wound on his chin, I would never know anything had happened at all. He was in good spirits and this time, it really didn't bleed much.
We arrived at the ER at about 4:15 pm and it was packed! I was really surprised to see so many people there on a Wednesday afternoon, but I guess you never know when it will be a busy day in the Emergency room. I had tried to call John from the car to tell him what was going on, but my cell phone wasn't working. So, once we got to the hospital I called him from there. It took him about an hour to get there, but we were still in the waiting room when he arrived. Poor Josh, it is hard for a 21 month old to entertain himself in a small waiting room and I was afraid to take him out side for fear I would miss them calling his name for treatment. We read magazines and pulled everything out of my purse. We pushed all the buttons on the soda machine and even played horsie on my knees. The other patients must have felt sorry for me because they were offering candy and such to help me keep him entertained. I should add that although, it is a very nice gesture to offer candy to a mother with a toddler in this situation, it really isn't helpful. First, he has a wound on his chin so I don't want candy to get into it. Second, this is a stranger and I am not likely to give my child candy from a stranger (don't we warn our children against this?) and last, once he sees this candy that I am not going to give him, his behavior doesn't exactly get better.
Anyway, the nurse finally came out at 6:30 (over 2 hours after our arival) and told me that there were no beds available in the ER and that she would recomend we go to the pediatric urgent care that had just opened. It is on site at the hospital, so we just walked over and they were able to see us shortly after they opened.
I need to make a correction to my earlier entry regarding Josh's stiches. Having only had stitches once myself, I didn't know all the terminology related to the process, but I do now. I had said previously that Josh had 9 stitches. I realize now how scarey that must have sounded. He actually had a running stitch that poked through the skin 9 times (I counted each visual thread as a stitch). In actuality Josh's wound was about an inch long, so there is no way they would have put in 9 individual stitches. I learned this when I went to see Josh's pediatrician to have the first set of stitches removed. By the time I met with the urgent care doctor, I had all my information correct. After speaking to me about the cut and Josh's medical history, the doctor asked me if I worked in the medical field. Of course, I said no and he just said that the details I gave him sounded like those that a doctor or nurse would provide. I thought that was pretty funny and just told him that I had no other medical training than what I had learned about Josh's illnesses and that I was just repeating what his pediatrician had told me. I thought that was funny, considering what I wrote in my last entry about being doctor Mom!
Anyway, this time around they had to sedate Josh because re-stitching skin is more difficult and they wanted him relaxed for the procedure. I must have really given the doctor 100 questions about the sedation medication, because he came back with a medical reference book to put my mind at ease about the risks. As it turns out it is a quick acting sedative and doesn't last long, so the risks are very minimal, but they have to be mentioned. Josh handled the procedure very well, and as it turned out this time he has 3 individual stitches. The entire wound did not re-open so only part of it had to be restitched. Josh cried when they gave him the shot of novicain to the chin, but other than that he was fine.
Josh has an appointment with his pediatician on Thursday to have these stitches removed. I think I will keep a bandage over his chin for a few weeks after the removal of these stitches, just to make sure he does not re-open this wound again!
In all the craziness, I didn't notice until this weekend that Josh has gotten 2 of his "2 year molars" in. My poor little man. With all this going on he is teething to boot!
Well, that's all I can handle for this week!
Thanks for reading!
Janet and Josh
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