Well here we are, our first visit to the Emergency Room!
The Story: Marin and I (Holli) were home packing boxes (if you don't know we are moving--I'll write another blog about why) and Marin decided she needed to retrieve all of her babies from my bed. I think there were 4 dolls she had set up on my bed to rest with and according to her, they were all crying and "they need me". I followed her into the room to make sure she was not going to jump on the bed (which is her all time favorite activity--Todd and I are great spotters) once I saw she was just gathering the dolls and her intentions were to bring them back out of the room I turned around and headed back to the living room to resume packing. I was listening all the while to make sure she did not start jumping, it makes me really nervous for her to jump on the bed with no one watching. I had not even picked up the next item to pack when I heard her fall off the bed. I ran back to the room to check on her, there was no screaming or crying. As I reached her she was standing up and said "my arm" but didn't actually start crying until she grabbed my neck.
She and I went over to the couch and sat down to cuddle, and at this point I didn't think she had actually done any damage, she was just fussing. However her fussing soon turned into crying and finally I called my friend Paige to find out what I should do, she suggested I first call our hospitals pediatrics department. Once I got in touch with the nurse on call she recommended we just go right over to the ER because it sounded like we would be needing an x-ray. At this point I started crying too. Todd arrived home at this point with the intention of going for a run, going out for pizza and packing for the rest of the evening...
We arrived at the hospital, with Marin asking the whole way "where is my dock-e-tor?" Everyone we saw was very kind, like all emergency rooms it did take a very long time--4 hours. Which means we did not eat dinner until 10:30 pm, but that Marin got to watch cartoons, which is always a treat to a child who never gets to watch television. She also got lots of stickers.
Diagnosis: according to the x-rays there was fluid on her elbow which 60% of the time means a fracture so Dr. Light who was attending the pediatric unit that night called in a doctor from orthopedics to view the x-rays. Dr. McCormic informed us that he did not see a fracture (which meant we did not have to wait for another team to come and set the bones, and put on a cast) however there was swelling which can cause other problems if it gets worse. But seeing as the accident had happened 5 hours before the actual x-ray was taken and there was still light swelling he thought she would be fine with a wrap, half cast fabric type material to hold a bend in her arm/elbow, and put her in a sling. He quickly and carefully wrapped her arm, Mairn was very brave and the told him "thank you" very quietly with her bottom lip stuck out.
We were dismissed, ate a quick sandwich, which brought about more tears because we had been talking about getting pizza for dinner that night and Marin was not about to let us forget our promises for her bravery (we will be having pizza for dinner tonight). By the time we actually got home and in bed it was 11 pm. Marin slept well for about four hours and then woke up saying it hurt, we gave her more motrin and she slept for another 4 hours. Her spirits are good and she's doing really well figuring out how to do things with one arm.
After this whole experience we are very thankful we did not have to have a bone set, surgery, cast, or more severe swelling which would have meant spending the night in the hospital. I do think we are all ready for an early nap though.
