We had just finished breakfast and Carey and I were still sitting at the table with coffee and the newspaper. The kids were playing and monkeying around and Emmett was trying to climb from the chair he was on to the chair I was sitting on. He slipped between the two chairs and hit his head (just above his eyebrow) on the edge of my chair on the way down. It was a really big cut, so we all headed down to Children's Hospital to get it stitched up. This was our first visit to Children's - we weren't even sure where the emergency entrance was! I guess that's something to be thankful for - almost 5 years and only one visit to the hospital.
The hospital wasn't very busy, but we still had to wait for a while (thank goodness for goldfish crackers and the iPad!!). They don't use a needle to inject freezing for kids (which is probably a good thing), but the gel they used took about half an hour to take effect. This is when Emmett really lost it. He had been doing well so far, but the gel had to have compression, so the nurse wrapped gauze around his head (including wrapping his one eye shut). He was not impressed with that, and howled until he finally worked his way out of the gauze. So they gave us a washcloth and told us to just hold that firmly on the spot.
Then it was time for the stitches. They swaddled him up like a little baby, and the nurse held his head still. I think he would've been okay with this, but then they put a cloth over most of his face (with the little hole for doing the stitches) and he went nuts. Howling, screaming, choking cries. Rip-your-heart-in-half cries. I was in there with him, and I almost started crying too. They originally had talked about 4 stitches, but they only put 3 in - maybe because he was so upset?
After the stitches were done was when I almost lost it. I had told every doctor and nurse that we saw that we were leaving soon for vacation, and they had told me that they would use dissolvable stitches, so we wouldn't need to worry about getting them removed while we were away. Well, I guess I missed one doctor - the doctor who actually did the stitches - and no one had told him (not even the student doctor who was standing. right. next. to. him.) and he did regular stitches. Needless to say, I was a bit upset about this, and there was no way after everything Emmett went through that we were going to try to change the stitches. However, after the doctors left, the nurse quietly asked me if I thought I could take the stitches out myself. She gave me some tweezers and scissors for removing the stitches, and gave me a quick tutorial about removing stitches. I'm not sure that I'll be able to do it myself, but I guess we'll see. They also gave me a prescription for antibiotics, in case he develops an infection.
Today he's been doing a bit better, but his eye looks more swollen and bruised today. I plan to research (aka google) "minimize appearance of scars" today, to see what I can put on it to help it heal better and hopefully not leave too big of a scar. That, or I need to start praying that his eyebrows grow in really big and bushy!
1 comment:
I've heard most parents say that they don't mind if their boys get stitches and such, because it seems more "okay" for boys to have scars than girls. He'd probably be proud of his scars. :)
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