"First Stitches" Day

This is incredibly long and most of you won't read it. I don't even blame you for not wanting to. It's really just a "for the books" post. Ya know, so Tadd knows we love him and everything. 

          Tadd had his first visit to the ER. We always have joked that he'd be our ER kid. He has no fear of anything and is always tripping and falling and running into things. On Friday, August 31st I was in the bathroom and heard a loud "clap" of a noise. Then I heard Aaron, trying to sooth Tadd before he'd even started crying. Then I heard..."NICKELL! There's blood, there's blood, there's blood, a lot of blood." He raced into the bathroom cradling Tadd in his arms, his neck and shirt were already blood soaked. He was right, there was a lot of blood. I had started grabbing toilet paper to put on the bleed before he'd even gotten in there but once I had a look at the actual cut, I said, "get Kade in the car we're going to the hospital." Blood was literally pouring out of Tadd's head. He had tripped and hit his head on the stone fire place. The impact cut through his eyebrow, all the way down to the bone. I grabbed a small towel to place on his head while we drove. Luckily we are minutes from the hospital. Kade and I climbed in the back seat and Aaron drove...the long way. (which still isn't very long but when you're in a huge hurry it feels like forever.) The whole way there I was wrestling with Tadd to keep the towel pressed firmly against the wound. In the process I was now covered with blood. Kade kept asking, "what happened?" and Tadd was screaming. As calmly as I could I tried convincing Kade that everything was OK and that Tadd just needed some stitches. Kade however, has only ever been to the hospital for himself and was slightly terrified he was in for something he didn't like.  About a block before we got to the emergency room, my arms gave out. I couldn't hold onto Tadd anymore. Luckily the bleeding had stopped significantly. It was just slightly dripping now. I was also able to get a better look at it, and could clearly see the bone. Tadd had stopped screaming, in fact, he'd stopped crying all together and didn't seemed bothered at all!

         The ER was packed! It appeared as though we were not the only ones that had decided to start Labor Day weekend off in the most eventful way we could think of. There was even another little boy, a little older than Tadd in there with the same injury. His was just on the opposite eye. We waited, and waited, and waited. The whole visit ended up being about 4 hours. Again, not the longest it could have been but when you're there waiting for your kid to be stitched up, 4 hours feels like forever! I was just glad Tadd is tough and didn't seem bothered. He thought the fish tanks were awesome and they gave him a coloring book and crayons to keep him busy. 

I wish so badly, that I had gotten a better picture of the actual injury. It was actually pretty cool. It wasn't cool that it was Tadd's injury, but the cut itself was cool! When he would blink or look around, you could see it so much better.  He was too busy looking around at everything happening in the waiting area to get a good shot of it though. 

Kade was being SO good! I was so glad too. He could definitely tell it was not a time to goof off and not listen. He walked right next to us as we were walking from the car. He sat right next to me was so patient waiting. Aaron dropped us off and ran home to get our phones, a new diaper, and the iPad. (Those are just not things you think to grab when you're running out the door, who knew?) 

After waiting for what seemed like forever, Aaron took Kade home to a babysitter so he could finally eat dinner and go to bed. While he was gone doing that, the stitches finally started going in. They had to sedate Tadd with a shot, so that he'd stay still while they stitched him up. With it being so deep they had to do internal and external stitches, and there's no way he would have been able to sit still, let alone allow the doctors to get the stitches in there in a way that would allow it to heal as well as possible! 

Aaron came back, just as they were finishing up. We had to stay there for a little longer so they could make sure he'd wake up OK and then we were free to go. Tadd waking up from sedation was the highlight of the whole evening. It was quite hilarious. He wasn't grouchy or crying, he was just really loopy. We were laughing pretty hard. 

That night I wanted to keep a close eye on Tadd just to make sure he was OK, so he slept in our bed. He was doing pretty well, again not seeming to be bothered by anything, just really tired. Then the tears started again. He was walking across the bed to come and lay down by me when he tripped (again) and bonked his head right into mine. It was a light hit but he hit his sore eyebrow right on my cheekbone. The poor thing couldn't lay on that side of his face for the rest of the night, no matter how asleep he was, it would wake him up. It was so sad! We finally gave him some children's Tylenol and he was able to sleep a little better! It was a long night for sure. 

Photo descriptions: (top left: the best photo of the cut we could get, top middle: Tadd only wanted Dad to hold him in the waiting area; top right: Tadd was playing with the tv speaker/remote thing, like it was a phone. He loved it! Bottom left: when Kade's patience started wearing thin, we let him play games and watch Netflix on the iPad. LIFESAVER! Bottom middle: Tadd was zoning. He was so tired! Bottom right: the next morning, all sewn up with the steri-strips on.)

Saturday, September 8th, Tadd got his stitches out. Hooray! Kade was especially excited for Tadd's eyebrow not to be blue anymore!

On our way out from getting the stitches removed, Kade's dreams came true! Life flight was getting ready to take off. Our car was parked right by the landing pad and we got to watch the whole time if took off. The pilots waved to Kade and he waved back. Once they started lifting off, I think it took him a little by surprise because it suddenly got incredibly windy. He was still in awe! That made his whole day!