Trip to the ER

Waiting, waiting, waiting.

Definitely a 10, maybe a 12 and that was for Keith and I!

Sad baby.
I was trying to distract him with the camera while we waited. It just seemed to tick him off more!

Battle wounds all stitched up.

So, as I mentioned in my previous post, yesterday was a beautiful day until I let Jonathan crawl in the grass. My parents are getting a new roof and all the supplies had been dropped off for the workers, including a roll of sheet metal. Nice, shiny, incredibly sharp sheet metal. Jonathan was literally by my feet checking out the grass, when he starts to cry. I look down and he has crawled over to the roll of sheet metal and all I see is blood. I believe I screamed, Oh my! Oh my! Oh my!

Keith swoops in. Scoops up Jonathan. Rushes in the house and washes his hand off to see the extent of the damage. Mom, dad and I are close behind. Andrew is in the sandbox oblivious to it all. Keith sees the massive cut on the inside of Jonathan's hand, below his thumb, yells for a towel and one of us to apply pressure and tells us we need stitches and the ER. He hands off Jonathan. Runs to the car and removes Andrew's car seat so I can sit next to Jonathan and hold his hand for the 15 minute drive to the ER.

This happened around 5:45 and we were at the hospital close to 6. We walk in and I see that the waiting room is packed. Not a good sign! But I had hope that because Jonathan was screaming, bleeding and little that we would be moved up to the top of the list. Unfortunately, there were 3 or 4 car accidents that had just occurred and those victims were ahead of us. They triaged us and decided Jonathan wasn't critical and so we waited. And waited. And waited.

Oh, and we weren't allowed to give him anything to eat or drink while we waited. Nice. I told the nurse that the doctor could hold him if they wouldn't let me nurse. I don't think she knew what to do with me. But I wanted to comfort my baby and make the screaming stop! Well the doctor did not hold him and the screaming did stop as long as we stayed outside and sang and walked. It finally got too cold and we had to go inside and wait some more.

We were finally brought back to a room around 9 pm and the doctor numbed Jonathan's hand and then did a very thorough check of his injuries. I'll skip the gory details, but I saw more of the inside of my little boy's hand than I EVER want to see again! Fortunately the doctor declared no tendon or nerve damage. He did, however, put 8 stitches in the cut by his thumb and 6 stitches in his finger. Oh, and did I mention that we had to help hold Jonathan down during this procedure as he screamed at us and at the doctor.

We did learn from all this that Keith is GREAT in a crisis. Me, well, let's just say I had a little trouble. When we were admitting Jonathan to the ER, Keith was holding him, and I was trying to answer the admit person's questions. Silly questions like his middle initial and date of birth. I think it took me a full minute to tell her his middle initial. I couldn't for the life of me think of his middle name. I ran through many names in my head before it came to me. Pathetic mother under pressure. She was very kind and understanding and told me she had other questions that she would ask me later.

Jonathan is recovering great! He slept through the night, which I did not expect. The injured thumb is also the thumb he sucks. (So, while I had been wondering how we would break the thumb-sucking habit, I didn't want this to be the method!) This morning he invented some sort of two-legged, one-handed crawl to get around. He has been walking, but isn't super steady. He kind of looks like a penguin. So, I figure by the time these stitches come out, walking will be mastered! And he's a little more cranky, angry than usual, but really who can blame him?!

The good news is that the doctor told us he will heal quickly and to check with our pediatrician to see if we can get the stitches out on Friday. Here's hoping and praying!

Thank you, Lord that the damage was fairly minor and for protecting our sweet boy!