Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Lions, Tigers, and Urgent Care, Oh My!

I'd planned to have a fairly quiet night of picking up and doing some laundry with the kiddos but life had other ideas. Drew fell on and then off a trampoline, falling onto the edge of the trampoline-direct hit to the shoulder-and then onto the ground-direct hit to the shoulder and face. His friend's mom called me right away, and from the sounds of it it was a tough fall to watch. (I'm feeling for her because there's something about any sort of breakage of another person's kid that is enough to induce the worst of the guilt-just in case she reads this I will again say that's why they're called accidents and you have absolutely nothing to feel bad about.)

Drew was attempting to be pretty stoic, he'd already cried in front of people-something that's pretty tough for a ten year old boy to do-and I could tell he was hurting. He was emphatic that he was fine and there was no need to see any doctors or anything, all while wincing and holding his shoulder. He still had grass embedded in his cheek. I told him I'd rather go to be sure and not have to do a worried visit to ER in the wee hours of the morning, so off to urgent care we went.

The girls got out their homework and settled in for the long haul. A friend and her daughter came in, so we caught up while I filled out paperwork and waited. Then into the exam room with the boys where Drew and I joked and talked to ease his nervousness and I attempted to keep Colin occupied (and stop him from touching the spinning stool/sharps container/blood pressure cuff/light/garbage/the floor/anything else disgusting or fragile & expensive by having him count to various numbers, spell words, and then look for different colored cars through the window.

A nurse, a doctor, and an x-ray later and we learned that there were no fractures, thank you God! just some bad bruising. After picking up some children's ibuprofen and cool ice packs and food for everyone we arrived home just before 8:00pm. So much for that free quiet night where we did a few chores and went to bed early.

We crammed the chores into about a half hour, three people bathed, and got settled in only to have the power go out. Then it was assessing that no one else's power was out and after finding the breaker box and resetting the switch to the miracle of electricity, getting the people calmed down enough to actually fall asleep.

Finally, it is quiet. I laid down with my book and dozed off. Only to be awakened at 2:00am by the weather radio to alert us that severe thunderstorms were coming (not uncommon in Iowa in spring.) So far the thunderstorms aren't that severe. Hopefully they stay that way.

I'll end this fairly banal post by saying that I'm actually pretty surprised that this was our first trampoline-related injury which means that the girls made it 12 years, Drew 10, and Colin 8. We don't have our own trampoline, but many friends do and my parents had one for awhile as well. I was the mean mom when they were young who wouldn't let them go all over the neighborhood and jump on trampolines even though the other kids could. I always felt bad because I know trampolines really are super fun, but I also was pretty paranoid that the odds weren't in our favor and its hard to make sure the kids are following the appropriate trampoline rules while gallivanting the neighborhood. I find it a little ironic (and funny) that given my previous vigilance that our first injury is in a safe place with a friend who takes awesome care of the kids in spite of their penchant for rowdy boy fun. Who says God doesn't have a sense of humor?

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