Sunday officially kicked my butt. Yesterday didn’t just beat me up–it punched me right in the kisser, held me down, and took my lunch money. Sunday had help. Friday softened me up for the kill with a little help from Thursday. Over a four day period I took my son on four trips to three different medical providers for two different issues.

Thursday was bad enough. Monkey noticed some swollen lymph nodes in his neck; they seemed to get bigger and more tender so I took him in. The nurse practitioner noticed a tick bite near the swollen glands. The tick had long since fallen off, but still. A TICK BIT MY BABY!

Then, on Friday, I got a call from the school. The secretary told me that Monkey was in the nurses office and I had to come get him and take him to the doctor, pronto. The nurse told me that he fell on the playground and split his head open and that he would need S-T-I-T-C-H-E-S (she spelled it out).

And if you didn’t know already, scalp wounds bleed. A lot. It was gruesome. Monkey proudly informed me that he didn’t even cry. Then he told the nurse that he didn’t cry and then he told the doctor that he didn’t cry.

Happily, they didn’t need to cut off any of his beautiful, golden hair to put in the three staples. But before they installed his new hardware, I got stuck with the difficult task of holding a piece of gauze soaked in numbing agent on that golden head for half an hour. Mr. Can’t-Sit-Still-Ever wanted to touch everything, climb on the gurney, pull on the room decorations, and generally make it nearly impossible to numb his little scalp.

Finally, after about forever, the doctor came in to install the staples. Monkey insisted on seeing the stapler first and declared that it looked like an alien robot. I’m so proud. After the staples went in, he said it just felt like he got stuck with a thorn from a rose bush.

Robots and roses, that’s my funny little man.

We took it kind of easy on Saturday. We went out to lunch and then hung around the house. I went to work and came home at my customary wee hour. Mr. Prairie told me that Monkey had complained of a headache in his temples and had been given ibuprofen.

Sunday morning came too early, as usual. We needed to go to the grocery store and thought we’d get out early, while other folks were in church. Then Monkey sidled up to me and said, “My head hurts here, ” one hand to his temple. “And here, ” other hand to his other temple.

I called the pediatrician’s answering service. The doctor-on-call (the kids’ favorite) told us to take Monkey to an urgent care center. I’m fairly certain that every runny nose in town was there. Monkey closed his game and rubbed his eye. He told me it hurt and that everything looked foggy. I promptly freaked.

Oh, I may have appeared calm, but I was all panicky on the inside. When I told the lady at the desk about the vision-thing, they told me to take him to the E.R. I insisted on seeing a doctor first. She told me he needed a head CT. Right then.

Having children brought a new level of fear into my life. When I was pregnant I was terrified of miscarrying or being murdered for my precious cargo. I didn’t like going anywhere alone and developed an unreasonable suspicion of (and hostility to) anyone who seemed too interested in my belly.

After Monkey was born, I was nearly paralyzed with fear. Fear of dropping him, bathing him, overdressing him, under-dressing him; fear that he wasn’t getting enough milk even when he topped the 90th percentile for weight. I was scared of SIDS, abduction, germs, anything that could possibly harm my child.

As he has grown and begun to venture the world (well, school anyway) without me, I’m scare because I’m not there to catch every fall, to cushion every harshness, to deflect the slings and arrows. I’ll have to face this same fear with my beautiful little girl next year, but for now, she’s still safe under Mama’s wing.

But yesterday, Sunday, that awful day, I was scared that my boy was going to die.

All from some stupid playground accident; all because my child, who knows no fear, tried to do a back flip on the monkey bars.

I couldn’t show that fear to my sweet baby, but several receptionists and nurses witnessed me fighting back the tears and the terror.

The coolest ER doctor on the planet (he had Chewbacca and Boba Fett on his stethoscope!) shone a bright ray of hope and joy into my black pit. After fully examining Monkey’s head, eyes, reflexes and cognitive functions, the doctor told me that a CT scan was not necessary. At worst, Monkey has the mildest of mild concussions.

After that, my alive-and-kicking baby tried to dismantle the gurney and demanded popsicles of everyone who entered the room.

After they sprung us we went out to lunch at his choice and then went grocery shopping. Both the kids were absolutely atrocious at both places and I couldn’t have been happier.

Oh, Monkey has promised us no more back flips! At least until I can get him into gymnastics.

After so many hours containing my abject terror and putting on the brave face, I cried all the way to work, while thanking God for saving my little boy.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 31st, 2009 at 2:14 pm and is filed under Healthy Family. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.