This is Sammy’s best life advice he has at the moment, he seems to tell almost everyone we hang out with these days. It is like his own little public service announcement for his fellow preschoolers.
We had a scary night in the ER a couple months ago with Sammy. I’ve been so busy I hadn’t had a chance to blog about it but wanted to be sure we never forget that night and the lessons learned. Gloria was keeping him at her house while I got some work done and she called to say I should come get him. He had put a rock in his nose and she was worried. When I got there however, he was sound asleep and looked as peaceful as could be. I used a flashlight to look up his nostril while he slept and I honestly didn’t believe Gloria, I couldn’t see a rock at all. I am beyond thankful my friend Jill and her girls happened to be visiting Gloria while I was there as she played such huge role in me staying calm and not freaking out. I let him sleep for a while until Jill’s husband who is a pediatrician advised we wake him and get it out since the nostril would swell. Yikes. I tried several times to blow it out by putting my mouth over his as advised but it wouldn’t budge and I am pretty sure my child thought I was actually trying to eat him. He was terrified every time my mouth came towards him! The afterhours clinic told us to bring him in a soon as we could and that is when the roller coaster ride began.
We saw 4 doctors, all of who laughed with us about it and found the humor in the situation. As each one held my scared little boy down (with the help of several nurses) and tried repeatedly to get the rock out we all realized it was not going to budge and was not quite the humorous situation we all thought it was. They decided to call a pediatric ear nose and throat specialist to meet us at the ER and if he couldn’t get it out they would surgically remove it at 8 am the next morning. WOW. I could not believe how serious things had gotten so quickly!
The ER doctors were so wonderful with Sammy. They found out he is a huge Lightening McQueen fan and put him in the room with all of his favorite cars on the wall. There was also a little girl a few months older than Sammy who had stuck 2 beads in her ear, so she was called “Bead in Ear” and Sammy was labeled “Rock in Nose”, which I found hillarious. I will spare the gory details but we basically had one of the worst nights of our lives. In hindsight we would have been much better off with the surgery. At least then he would have not felt the pain and fear. They were able to remove the rock but it took a nurse holding Sammy’s head, one to hold his arms, one his legs, and one that held him on her lap in a bear hug type position. The ENT and an ER pediatrician worked for a good 25 min on the rock. There are no words to describe how horrible it was to see my baby screaming like I have never heard before with so much blood. He had past the crying point and was screaming and shaking, it was so bad I had to leave for a few min since it made me sick. I felt so helpless. Gloria and I prayed the whole time, while Sam stood next to our baby and tried his best to comfort and encourage Sammy. It was so scary but thankfully the rock came out and the entire kid area of the ER cheered and were giving high fives.
I don’t know if I was more happy the day he was born or the moment that ginormous rock came out, it was such a feeling of relief. He had a pretty bloody nose for a few days after and he had nightmares for a solid two weeks after, poor baby. In fact, the incident still works its way into his play times, he reenacts it when he is pretending with his cars which is a normal way of processing it all in his little mind. It was quite the ordeal but it made me so thankful that we were only there for a rock and nothing more serious. I am so thankful that I have a healthy child and we do not have to frequent hospitals. This experience has made me thankful on a daily basis that he has no serious health conditions.
Thank you to all of you who prayed us through that awful night and for all of the encouraging text messages while we were there!
Here is a picture with him, his rock, and his stickers. It was taken the next morning so hopefully the bloody nose is not too yucky for you. He was so proud and I wanted to capture the moment.
The rock is in the container, I was hoping to show how big it was but it didn’t come out.
He got two cool stickers about being a tough guy and a brave boy!That he was!
