“Maybe We (I mean I’ll) have to see if he needs stitches,” Dad said of the gash above Firstborn’s left eye. Not once, he tripped over a giant (stuffed toy) crocodile at the amusement center. It didn’t seem like much more than the usual fall-down-go-boom routine, but he first: very So broken on it, I got out the fluorescent bandages (bandages) and put one on her and one on Dad. Firstborn wouldn’t keep her on, nor would she tolerate an ice pack, so I thought “Okay, it’s bedtime, anyway, let’s just go to sleep.”
Well, when she woke up, the cut was still dripping, or maybe she brushed it off with her sleeve… Either way, this brings us to the big debate. Will he need stitches? I was hesitant, because I didn’t think they’d want to sew a kid’s face, but I thought butterfly patches would be tolerated as well as Dobais (I don’t even know if they use butterfly patches — I’m referring to my own childhood, which was a generation ago, really).
Dad said, “Well, wouldn’t you feel bad if we found out that she should have been sewing and she didn’t?”
I weighed my options and wondered what I would feel bad about, the possible scars or someone sewing up my child’s face while holding her.
“Okay! Okay!” So I called our doctor’s office. But since it was after hours on a Sunday, I spoke to an on-call doctor I didn’t know. I felt like a fool trying to explain, “Well, he cut his head off a few hours Before, and I’m calling now…the cut isn’t very deep…but it’s not really closing…and kind of oozes.
The doctor advised me to take the firstborn to the emergency room. So, I psyched him to enter the car. go for one horse riding with Mom! Let’s get dressed — we’re going to see Doctor! Luckily, I had a diaper bag (I learned), and we were out the door without too much delay.
It was a beautiful night with a full moon, and we had plenty to talk about on our journey. “Darkness. Stars. Moon. Horse’s house. Car. Night. Doctor!”
We reached the hospital, which is 25 minutes away. I wondered if I should have gone to the nearest hospital, but since it didn’t seem like a huge emergency – I mean, we waited a few hours before we even called – we went to the bigger hospital. This was our “regular” hospital, where all our doctors were affiliated and where the boys were born.
When we got out of the car I looked at Firstborn’s cut again. It didn’t really look bad to me.
When we checked in, the receptionist said, “Oh, no need to ask why you There is only one seat here; There are some people before you. There are some toys in the corner under the TV.”
I turned around and saw that there were many other groups in the room. There were other little boys playing with toys. I asked the firstborn, “Toys, honey, or sit with mommy?” “Sit down, mother,” he said, but he wanted to see the other boys. Their mom tried to rein them in, and I said, “Well, he’s not sick or anything. He might just need stitches.”
“Oh, I am see” she said, eyes darting to the bruises on my son’s face. “I can’t believe you’re so calm.”
Then I started to feel really Guilty about how I was a mother that I didn’t call the doctor right away, that I hesitated to call even hours later, that I was “so cool!?”
And there was no place to sit near the TV. First, three times our name was called, I didn’t hear, and second, everyone was staring at us—or so it seemed. Before it was time to go to the ER, we were called in twice — once for the admin and once for the initial procedure, where the tech did a bunch of diagnostics and plastered some cold gel on a cotton ball on Firstborn’s head and tied it with a bandage. I prayed that he would continue because it didn’t just clean the cut, it supposedly numbed it. “If he needs stitches,” she whispered. “We don’t have to whisper; she doesn’t know what stitches are,” I whispered.
Finally, it’s our turn to go behind the double doors, to the actual doctor’s department in the emergency room. Nurse technicians wheel in a TV/VCR combo with various selections, incl Clues of blue. While waiting for the doctor we watched a whole video. Finally, he arrived.
We exchanged pleasantries, and as I was signing X on the forms on his clipboard, the doctor said the cutest thing: “Well, I don’t. there is Sew it up, but it will probably be better.” Thank you, doctor!
I turned around when the Firstborn said tentatively, “Mom?” And try not to act alarmed. The nurse cradled him like a child, her arms tied by his sides.
I said, “Okay, honey.” (Though I really didn’t think so – I would have been shocked to be mummified like that.) “Mom here.” And I climbed on the gurney with him.
I saw the doctor sewing. I’m usually grossed out by this sort of thing, but I imagined Dad watching the baby’s birth by C-section, and I thought if he could see it, I could see it. Also, I didn’t want to predispose the Firstborn to the idea that something untoward was going on. I had to put on a brave front.
He was fine until the fourth stitch and then started to lose it. poor kid It was late, he had waited in the hospital for more than two hours, and he was bound in a sheet, unable to move his arms and legs.
After the fifth stitch, the doctor announced that she was done. I got off the table, the nurse unwrapped the firstborn and released him, and he melted into my arms. We sat together for a few minutes to pull ourselves together. I was relieved that she was such a good sport and that what could have been a miserable experience wasn’t actually that bad (not that I want to repeat it anytime soon…).
“Ready to go, honey?” I asked as the nurse returned to prepare the room for the next patient.
“I’m ready, mom!” Dr. Firstborn. And to the nurse, “Thank you.” And to the other patients in the ward, “Bye-bye, Noon Night!”
And we “darkness, stars, moon, horse house, car, night, doctor.”
