Of Course She Is
Posted By jayna on May 24, 2011
This morning I helped E get dressed for the day. It’s a rare occasion that she’ll let me have any part in her daily ritual of piecing together the most eye-catching color and pattern combinations, so I breathed a sigh of relief when she calmly selected a new dress. Much simpler than finding tops and bottoms and in-betweens. As I helped her pull it over her head, I noticed that the bottom had a string hanging from it. I gave it a little tug, and then a little more. Around and around, that little string unraveled all along the hem-line.
If I hadn’t tied it off in a nice and neat knot and then snipped it clean, it would have just kept going and going and going.
So much like our day that was to follow.
There is little to top the night we’ve had . . . 4 hours spent in the Pediatric ER with our fingers crossed that MJ’s arm wasn’t broken . . . though I can’t help but wonder if the icing on the cake is still out there. Inch by inch, that string came unraveled, all day long. Phone calls about banks and appraisals and movers and landlords and this and that and every which way another thing to go wrong. After hanging up with the husband, from a very intense and mildly profane conversation about said banks and appraisals and movers and landlords and this and that, I turned around just in time to see that string get yanked out by the foot.
Oblivious to everything around her, E plowed over MJ, knocking her to the ground. Still oblivious, she just kept right on walking and stomped right over her sister, one foot landing directly on MJ’s arm. There were screams and tears and more screams. An hour of poking and prodding and waiting to see if it would stop hurting her quite as much. When she continued to burst into hysterical screams every time I so much as breathed on her arm, the deciscion was made to take her in. By myself, of course – because the husband is back at work for the week – and with a hyper and whining E.
There is a special level of hell equal to that of the waiting room of an ER. Especially a Pediatric waiting room, where everything is covered in sick kid germs and beckons to practically be licked by every other kid.
And so, we waited. MJ kept her face buried in my chest, with her arm gently resting in her lap. Every time I shifted or even slightly jostled her, she screamed bloody murder. I touched the top of her hand or her arm, gently as ever, and she screamed even louder. With a tear stained face, she continued to let me know that “Arm. Ouch. Big ouch.”
Eventually, the time came for X-rays and she was handed off to a nurse while E and I waited outside the room. The screaming only got louder. And then . . . then, they brought her back out to me. Her face lit up and she stopped crying. Stretching out both arms, she reached out and grabbed me, clinging onto my shoulders for dear life. With both arms. We went back to the waiting room, and she gave me a high five. With that arm. She climbed on chairs, clapped her hands, held her toys and food, and acted like a caged monkey for the next two hours that we continued to wait.
Two more hours of waiting room hell, just to see that she was fine all along. Nothing but a bruise.
And me looking like that mom that panics when their child gets a wittle bitty boo-boo.
I really hope that string got tied off good, because I’m just not up for a repeat kind of day tomorrow.
Glad she’s OK, although being able to throw, “Yeah, well, you broke my arm!” at your sister every time any sort of injustice comes to light might have been pretty fun for her. In a totally not worth it way, of course.
I am so glad she is okay and don’t worry I have 2 drama queens even though I have one boy :O Yeahh everything is “OMG It hurts end of the world lets rush to the ER just to be safe only to find out I am right and have given birth to drama queens to loves a trip to the hospital”….