Thumbs up?

It had to happen at some point, right? On Tuesday, we took Grey to the emergency room.


I had just remembered a box of vases, candles, and frames and spent a few minutes unpacking them. Liam and Dash must have moved one of the glass vases to the stairs. When I was in the kitchen throwing a few things away, I heard a thump and a crying Grey. Expecting Grey to have dropped something on his foot or something, I was quite surprised to find bloody hands! There was the glass vase, broken in several pieces. Who knows if it broke before or after Grey handling it.

I rushed him over to the sink, found the cuts, and saw that one seemed very thick with blood. I applied a whole lot of pressure while texting Sean, "Grey needs stitches." What a note to receive! I was contemplating how I'd keep the pressure while driving (obviously I couldn't). When I finally removed pressure, I quickly slapped a bandaid over it, which instantly filled. So I slapped three more all around it, which seemed to contain the blood. Thank goodness.

My head a-flutter, I got all the kids ready to go. I got Sean on the phone, who said to come to his hospital rather than the one nearer our house- he'd be able to come be with us. Grey had been understandably upset this whole time but once he stepped foot outside, the cries stopped. Not a peep during the 15 minute drive. And in the ER waiting room, he was all smiles!

We were in the hospital about 3.5 hours, mostly waiting. Sean commented how different it is being so busy as a physician in the hospital and being on hold as a patient in the hospital. Grey got upset when he was getting numbing shots, as would I. He also had to get some x-rays to make sure there wasn't more glass in the wound- he was a champ during that.

The incident happened just before I was going to put Grey down for his nap, so the kid hadn't slept yet. He finally fell asleep around... 4:30? He got about 20 minutes on my lap until they were ready to suture. Poor kid. Thankfully, for all procedures, they let Grey stay on my lap. But he still was not happy while being sown. I don't think his thumb was very numb because he was jerking back at every poke.


But it finally ended and now he has six lovely stitches to show off. They'll stay in for two weeks and then Sean can take them out. He's been doing well since Tuesday. It certainly still bothers him but doesn't keep him from doing much. He's already learning to compensate more with his right hand. He's definitely not sleeping well but hopefully that'll work itself out soon. I'm just really grateful that this whole thing turned out as well as it did. Specifically:
1) Sean switched with another resident to be at this hospital this month. Had he not, he'd be about 40 minutes away. I wasn't doing that with a bleeding kid in my car.
2) Sean's coworkers covered for him so that he could be there with us the entire time. It made it 10,000x better to have him there.
3) Grey was so happy for so much of the time! I was so impressed with his stoicism.
4) The injury could have been so much worse. My sister-in-law texted me later, telling me that a simlar thing happened to her at Grey's age except her finger was practically sliced off. She had to have surgery to repair it and still doesn't have full function in it. Stitches don't seem so bad!
5) Liam and Dash were wonderful the whole time. They gave Grey lots of soft kisses and loving hugs.