Wednesday, May 24, 2006

Crazy few days!

I survived having my molar pulled... barely.

Then of course Monday was Kyan's appt with the orthopedist. We drove about 5 hrs total for about 20 minutes with the ortho. Seriously. Basically, he's got what Forrest Gump had. Um.. except for the low IQ part. See, years ago they'd put braces on a child with legs like Kyan, but have since learned it doesn't help. Actually nothing does. It'll either go away or it won't. If it doesn't go away tho, he's going to be FAST!!

*bad Southern accent* Ruuuuun Kyyyyaaannnn.... rruuuuuunnnnn...

Um, yeah. According to the Dr, a lot of Olympic runners and faster athletes have this condition with their legs - for some reason it makes you faster than average. So okay... if he doesn't outgrow it he's going to walk funny, but he won't get beat up because he'll be able to outrun the bullies!! Yay Kyan!!

So we got that taken care of.

Tuesday morning Jaben comes downstairs and tells me he needs to see Dr Chris (our family Dr). I asked him what was wrong and he showed me his foot. Can I just say EW?? About a month or so ago, Jaben got a BIG splinter in his foot. Despite his fits (he can't stand having splinters pulled at ALL) I pulled it out. We cleaned it up, put a bandaid on it and I forgot all about it. Until Tuesday morning.

For a month, this kid has been walking around with leftover splinter in his foot. And he didn't tell anybody. Because he thought it was normal.

That's right - he thought it was normal. It hurt, it was red, it was getting puffy - but he thought it was normal. Grandma had managed to convince him it was not normal, but he wouldn't let her touch it - only Dr Chris could do it. So, when I got to work on Tuesday I called and got Jaben a 3:00 appt. At an office I'm not overly familiar with. But it was fine - I'd rather drive there and head off further infection than wait.

I took Jaben out of school around 2:15 and off we went. We found the office okay and were right on time for his appointment. Dr. Chris took a look at the foot in question, and decided that yes, it was a splinter stuck in there and that the skin had grown around it like scar tissue, so it was going to have to be cut out. He said he'd give Jaben a shot to numb it up, and then he'd feel nothing. It'd be easy.

Except that I forgot to mention that Jaben is afraid of needles.

We all got into position: me, sitting behind him on the table holding his upper body, the nurse holding his legs down, and Dr Chris all ready with the needle. Jaben took one look at the needle and freaked out. Big, fat tears, not breathing, all tight... not pretty. Kind of amusing if you're familiar with his tough-guy act, but not pleasant for the Dr. In spite of the fits, we continued on anyway. I put my hand over Jaben's eyes and told him deeeep slow breaths, baby, just think about breathing... while Dr. Chris put the needle in and... the splinter popped out.

The pressure of the needle under it must have been just what was needed to push the splinter up and out so no cutting was required, thank God! It was the biggest thing I've ever seen, about 1/4" (check a ruler, that's big for a splinter), especially considering it'd been living in his foot for a month!! So all he needed to have done at that point was the infection squeezed out and the nasty skin scraped off. EW.

But no stitches, thankfully. Imagine how stitches would've been, after how awful just the shot was going!! He's got to take antibiotics for the next 10 days, but he's fine.

My children have been informed that nobody is allowed to get sick, have big boo-boos, or emergencies until at least October. I figure I'll have recovered from this week by then. I mean, October is 5 months away. Even my kids can go 5 months without emergencies... right??

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm glad Kyan's appointment turned out okay...thanks for calling me and telling me how it went (hint, hint) LOL. I just hope he doesn't start calling me "Aint Jinny".

Poor Jaben...I'm glad the splinter came out easily, but geez...what a huge peice of wood to have in your foot!

And if it makes you feel any better about boo boos....your nephew thinks he can fly. :) Nate tried to jump off the couch yesterday (sitting right next to me) and landed on his head. The back of his head, but still...scared the bejesus out of me, and really did nothing more than scare him. He didn't even get a bump. Poor little guy. :(

Fingers crossed for no more unplanned hospital/doctor visits....

ninepounddictator said...

Wow. What a week!
I kind of like the fact he could be a fast runner. I love kids who are athletic. Always jealous of those kids.

Also, I wanted to say what you wrote on my post chilled me. Kids can be so awful. And the fact is, there are so many parents who have to deal with it.

IT makes me frightened. Actually, one of my friends son went through the same thing. And this kid is cute, dressed the same as every other kid, and got basically everything else all the kids have (games, electric guitars.)

But, for some reason, some of the kids just decided not to like him. And he had to switch schools. I couldn't believe it.

I tell you,, i think it's worse to have a kid that is a bully though...those kids grow up, well not so good.

Mom on the Run said...

OH MY! That is such a story. My daughter would always scream in hysterics whenever we had to take out a splinter. One was so huge, I had to have my Mom come over and calm her down so we could get at it. I SWEAR to you, she almost passed out on the bathroom floor!

Rebecca said...

Jen - buy Nate a cape. Then at least he can play Superhero while he's furniture hopping! Just don't let him land on shoes and break his foot. ;-)

Rebecca said...

Rebecca - that's about how it was with Jaben. The only difference I can come up with is being from a single-parent home and I really didn't think kids noticed that at his age. It happens more than people think - a lot of the time because it's put off as "kids will be kids" - but it can be very damaging. I don't think it's jumping the gun at all, worrying about fitting in at 2. Seriously, keep doing what you're doing!

Rebecca said...

Mommy on the verge (sorry I don't know you're first name!!!) - I have to lol at that! When I first tried to get the giant splinter out, Jabe was the same way! Screaming, shaking and I actually had to yell "hey, look over there!" and pull the part that was sticking out when he fell for it. Shoulda known it wasn't all out. Aren't the dramatics such fun??

Anonymous said...

Yeah, that's all I need...the kid to actually *think* he can fly. Sheesh. :)

And I swear I'm sending out pictures and video tomorrow. I promise. Honest. ;)