In a split second

Gavin and Abby were so cute this week as they both sat at the picnic table in the living room drawing on magna doodles. Gavin had brought his small Cars magna doodle down from his room and Abby wanted in on the action. Of course, Gavin didn’t want to share. I went to the car to get another small magna doodle I keep in the car for Gavin. They both sat down on the same side of the picnic table to play.

I had to take the opportunity to take some pictures of them. I haven’t tortured them with my incessant picture taking during play time in a while. It was time.

They were so peaceful and for the most part calm…

…except when they weren’t.

And then there was a swap of magna doodles. Why not change it up? Let Abby color on the Cars magna doodle and Gavin can take the yellow one. Gavin said it was Abby’s idea to switch but I’d venture to guess it was his own.

But in one split second everything can change. The calm, peaceful afternoon can degrade into complete chaos and breathless fear.

This sweet baby girl sitting here flipped backwards off of the picnic table in the one second I took to look down at my camera and see if I actually liked the picture I’d taken. I heard the crash of toys she hit on the way down and I heard her hit the floor. I thought for certain it had just scared her or worst case she had hurt herself falling on the toys. I was wrong.

As I went to pick her up I bent over her and saw the blood rushing into the area of her nose between her eyes. She was swelling so fast and in such a way that it was alarming. Then I realized she had blood running down her face and I knew we needed help. I was having trouble deciding what kind of help we needed. I ran her to the kitchen and grabbed a clean cloth out of the drawer and put it on her face. She was less than pleased but I had to get her to stop bleeding. I called Brandon who couldn’t understand a thing I said between me not being able to breathe and speak clearly and Abby screaming in the background. I’d considered calling 911 as the swelling was so impressive and I thought at any second the blood would have nowhere else to go and come gushing out of the already bleeding cut. Not to mention, that kind of swelling on the head or face would be cause for concern. There was no doubt we’d be seeing a doctor that afternoon, whether it was her pediatrician, urgent care doc, or the ER, I just hadn’t figured it out yet. But, when Brandon said he couldn’t understand me and to call 911 he helped me realize I needed to do what I’d originally considered doing.

You would think that being a 911 dispatcher I’d be able to 1)handle my own emergency with complete calm, and 2)be able to easily call 911 with no hesitation. Abby was clearly conscious, breathing fine, alert, and I had bleeding controlled. Running through the whole thing in my head I struggled with whether to bother emergency services with this. The call was made and then we waited…and waited…and waited. At least, that’s how it felt. That’s how it always feels to the person waiting for help. I tried putting a cold pack on her face to help with the swelling. She liked that about as much as the cloth. Gavin said, “Mommy I’m scared.” I told him it was okay and we just needed to get Abby looked at and then we’d decide where we needed to take her. Other than that he was pretty much silent the entire time.

The medic arrived and the guys stood in the driveway staring at me standing in my front door holding my poor little girl. Apparently they were afraid of Mocha, our big, ridiculously friendly, Labrador. The guy yelled for me to put her away...sure I’ll get right on that with my injured child in my arms. He finally came up to the door and asked if she’d bite and I assured him there was no chance she’d bite. He said she could stay out. Once that was settled they looked over Abby. He offered to take her to the ER but said that as long as I was comfortable with it she’d be fine to go to the children’s urgent care. I asked Gavin to use the potty, get his shoes out of the closet, and put on his coat. He was done with all three tasks in a quick fashion and proudly stated, “I’m ready to go!” The medics left and I got us packed up to leave.

Thankfully the urgent care was not that busy. Brandon came from work and met us there. Abby was very upset when the doctor came in and had to look at her injury. The doctor determined that Abby didn’t need stitches or even glue and she didn’t think her nose was broken but even if it was there wasn’t anything to be done about it because it wasn’t deviated. Course of treatment is Neosporin and washing with soap and water twice a day.

How’d she end up with a cut across her nose and that kind of swelling when she fell backwards? Well, the only thing I’ve been able to determine is that she still had the pen from the magna doodle in her hand when she fell backwards. The pen is attached to the magna doodle and I suspect that when she fell backwards the entire magna doodle snapped back with her and hit her right in the face.

Here she is right before bath time about three hours after the initial injury. She was still swollen but not nearly as badly as she had been right after it happened.

The bruising is much more impressive in person.

This is the day after the big owie. Poor girl had a sore nose, runny nose, and is teething at the same time but she still has a smile on her face!

I took this picture on March 31. The bruising is starting to move down under the corners of her eyes a bit but her cut is healing up nicely. The doctor said the bruising usually ends up running down the face before it goes away so we’ll see how she looks over the next couple weeks. Overall though, we are doing much better than we were on Monday!