not the face!

This isn't a funny blog, for once, but it's an Andy story that I'm sure I'll never forget.

Last night was Andy's first (real) trip to the ER. We'd hosted a dinner party and as I was helping our company down the ridiculously long sidewalk to their car, this was unfolding: Andy was charged up by the presence of his father and his puppy who were wrestling together. He started doing a classic Andy move - the spin. He spins around in circles until he crashes into something.

Well, he did crash into something. With his face.

He landed, face-first, on the raised wooden rim of his train table, and when Shawn heard the thwack he knew it was bad. Andy stood up clutching his nose and when Shawn pulled his hands away he saw a 1-inch gash right under Andy's nostrils. It bled and bled and when I walked back into my kitchen thinking about the successful dinner party we'd had with Molly and Thomas and the children, I was confronted with my bloody little boy in hysterics. We checked him out for a few minutes and it became rapidly clear that he needed stitches, so off to the ER we went.

I was amazed at how placid everybody at the ER is when a child is bleeding. It obviously wasn't life-or-death, so we had to 'check in', sit in the waiting room, register (ocean view or poolside?) and then wait a while in the back area. (A little girl with obvious pinkeye was right behind us so that added a nice element of 'ick' to the whole scene.)

Anyway, to make a long story short, they were kind enough to use a numbing substance on Andy's laceration before they used the lidocaine. They said it would decrease the pain of the shot by about 50% but that it would still hurt him. He had to sit with this substance on his nose for about 15 minutes and while he did he calmed down. We sang some songs and laughed a little bit. But it was terrible for me because I knew when those 15 minutes were up that I was going to have to hold down my little boy as they put a needle in his open laceration. I thought I was going to puke, seriously.

When the time finally did come, they practically had to wrench him from my grip. To make matters worse, they laid him down on a sheet and then wrapped his arms to his sides so he couldn't squirm. Which was good, but was awful at the same time. They tied down my baby boy! A nurse held his head and Shawn and I held his feet, which was terrible. When they gave him the shot they said he'd really cry. But to their utter amazement, he only whimpered. It clearly hurt and he squeezed out some tears, but the doctor and nurses said that most children screamed and thrashed during this part.

I, meanwhile, turned my head, put it on Shawn's shoulder, and bawled like a little weiner. I didn't let Andy see me, of course, but it was just about the worst thing ever. Once he was numb he didn't cry much. He did a little more whimpering as they stitched him, and I watched to keep eye contact with him but hated watching them put a needle through my little boy's face. They had to put in six stitches. Quite a lot. It took forever, it seemed. During the sewing, he told them about the diggers he'd seen during the day, and about the baby groundhogs we have in our yard. The nurses said what a brave boy he was and complemented us several times on what a beautiful face he has.

Well, duh.

Of course, now that beautiful, perfect face will have a big scar under the beautiful, perfect nose. The stitches make him look a little like Hitler. When they sat him up he was well past any tears and I promptly dug out a candy bar from my purse and he gobbled it, numb lip and all. Had my mother been there she would have probably met him in the parking lot with a pony.

Being a boy, I know this is likely the first of many ER trips. I tell you though, that was awful for a mom to endure. But when we got home, the first thing he did was go right back to his train table, the source of the injury, and he had to be dragged away from his beloved trains for bed at 10:30pm.

Boys.