Max & Rebecca: Charlie's trip to the ER

Thursday, December 26, 2013

Charlie's trip to the ER

Charlie got to have his first trip to the Emergency Room on Sunday. I'm glad he waited until he was at least two. Knowing that I have an active boy and having to take a couple childhood ER trips myself, It was just a matter of time before we took Charlie.

So this is how it happened...

We were enjoying a wonderful Sunday evening at our friends' house decorating gingerbread cookies...

...when we were sugared out, Max started playing with Charlie and Madeleine with the large yoga ball. Everything they were doing should have been totally safe and both kids were being well supervised by the adults. At one point, Max was holding Madeleine while Charlie climbed and sprawled his body across the yoga ball. He lost his balance and the ball quickly turned, rolling Charlie into a corner of the wall. He immediately cried and when Max picked him up we noticed some blood on his head. Kerri and Corbrett were quick to get some wet and dry paper towels while Max cleaned and investigated the wound and I tried to comfort my little boy. Max said it looked like it may be deep and it probably could use a stitch. Charlie settled down a bit and Kerri made him a goody bag from the candy we had decorated our gingerbread with. This was seriously a life saver. If the choice is between crying and candy, Charlie will choose candy. And I didn't have one little bit of guilt overloading him on candy if it was helping distract him from the pain.
Charlie had mostly calmed down but we decided to leave our get together a little early to see what the Doctors had to say about his head. The car ride was a little uncomfortable for him. He only cried though when we was trying to touch his wound and I held down his arms so he couldn't. I tried to distract him with more candy and looking at Christmas lights.

We arrived to the ER and were seen immediately. The doctor and nurse looked at the gash and said they would need to clean it to see how deep it was but it would likely need a staple. they told us that in many head cuts they are able to put in a little glue then tie the hair in a way that would hold the cut together, but Charlie's hair was too short (I had just cut it a couple days earlier). They put a gauze pad on the back of Charlie's head and held it there with some medical tape that would help numb the area so they could clean it, investigate it further, then staple it if need be.

Charlie with his ninja headband

In the meantime, Charlie was feeling tons better exploring the doctors office and playing with bubbles. We were sent out to the waiting room to wait for the numbing to kick in. You would have thought Charlie was at some exciting outing with the way he was acting. He loved playing in the waiting room and running around giddily all while wearing his ninja headband. We had to wait for quite awhile this time and it was getting late but we soon were able to go see the doctor. They cleaned the wound and agreed that Charlie would need a staple. Charlie was so cooperative through all of this. I was definitely a proud mama. He let them clean his head even though he was getting quite wet, he let them check his ears, which has never been a favorite in the past, he sat completely still as they put a staple in his head. Whether it hurt or not, I still consider it a miracle that my 2-year-old sat still.
We were then able to bring him home. We worried that we would play with the staple or that he would wake up in a couple hours when the numbing had worn off but none of the above happened. He had a great nights sleep and didn't seem to notice the staple. There have been a couple times since that he was touched the staple out of curiosity but he hasn't picked at it or played with it constantly. This is another miracle. He will get the staple removed on January 2nd. Overall, I'm grateful that this was such a minor injury to what it could have been, I'm also grateful that Max was there and has a vast knowledge of emergency care. I'm also grateful that Charlie was so calm through this whole ordeal because I know that if he wasn't I couldn't have been calm either!

And here are some more blurry phone pictures.