Jolie & the Non-ER Visit

I don't know who was scared more.. me or one of the sweetest little girls I know.  I was a weird and sickening moment to realize that your baby is hurt.  The thoughts that race through your head when you imagine of the possibilities of what the next few moments could bring.  Before panic can even set in, you as a mother, as a parent, go into w o r k mode and assess the situation before you even know what you are doing.  Jordan talks about this a lot in his line of work - not only as a firefighter/paramedic, but also as a medic in the ER of one of the largest children's hospitals in the state of Texas. He deals with this sort of thing.. but one thing is for sure, those kiddos are not his own.

Before you read on.. I'll be sharing some semi-yucky pictures, so stop now if you think it is something you don't want to see.

There.  You've been warned:)

Flash Back 

The weekend of the gender reveal party.. literally the day before.  I had left the house really early to run a few last minute errands, and Jordan took the girls to breakfast, and then out for his own errands that morning.  I arrived home first, and when he pulled up with the girls, I was busy putting away groceries and making them something for lunch.  He walked in and straight back to our bedroom.  He calmly walked back out to the kitchen and asked: 

"Have you been in our bathroom?"

"No... why?"

"Go look."

I thought he was going to lead me to inches of water flooding our room, but alas- it was even more unexpected than I could imagine.

No one was even home to witness any of this happen.. and while Jordan was looking for bullet holes (we do in fact live in Texas, you know..) there was ZERO sign of anything foreign that could have been the culprit to this mess.  And it was SUCH a mess.

Jordan spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning up glass, digging it out the the tile and tub.  Literally in his work gloves and knee pads scooping piles of heavy glass into a box to discard.

Once he finally finished, he sat down at he kitchen table and started flipping through the phone book. 

Who are we even supposed to call about this?

Fast Forward

A week later.  We had taped off (most) of the metal framed area around the missing shattered glass, and while there was no glass left in the frame, there was still some wedged deep that we couldn't reach and needed to leave it for the professionals. The replacement glass had been ordered, and in the meantime we were still bathing Parker and Jolie in the tub in our bathroom, just as usual.  Maybe it was out of pure laziness (because these days I'm taking all kinds of short cuts to give my body a break), but ALL of their bathing necessities were within reach in our bathroom.. and they aren't in the tub every night (again with the short cuts..)

But, here I am making excuses for the silly decision I made to continue to bath my babies in a tub with a hazard nearby. 

I turned to grab their towels hanging on the back of the bathroom door, and grabbed my phone to text Jordan that was in the kitchen making quesadillas for dinner, explaining to him that I could shred the cheese if he wanted me to in about 5 minutes.. 

Right about this time, Jolie carried a handful of foam letters with intentions to stick them on the shower glass- just as she had done 800 times before.  

Except this time there was no glass.

I watched in slow motion, and couldn't move fast enough to catch her before she stumbled over the glass.  Her left arm fell onto a place that was completely covered by safety tape, and her right arm, unfortunately, fell into some free glass that remained in the metal frame.  

Startled, she stood up and fussed a little.. I embraced myself for the aftermath of the fall, but there was no blood.  At least not immediately.

But then it came.  Lots of it.  

In attempts NOT to panic, I hollered for Jordan from the bedroom in hopes he would hear me.  I wasn't leaving one bleeding baby let alone two babies in a tub full of, now bloody, water.  

He came in the instant - and I was relieved and hoped to see the normally calm medic husband of mine.

"Crap.  CRAP."

I wanted to vomit.  Even he was freaking out a little.  I thought for sure we were going to the ER. 

He finally got it cleaned up enough to be able to assess the situation, and there were 3 main cuts.  The largest just took off the surface of the skin, so it wasn't serious, but the other two were much much deeper, and had started to bruise pretty quickly.  Jordan was most concerned about those.  Jolie, of course was screaming.  I had tears rolling down my face, and poor Parker was SO confused.  Her little brain could't figure out what the heck was going on.

At this point we were out of the bath and was able to hold pressure on her arm long enough to get her halfway dressed so we could clean and disinfect the area.  Jolie was freaking out.  I mean full on screaming.  That child does not scream like that.  She was terrified.  I don't even think it was really from pain, but more because she was so scared. 

 We attempted to throw the iPad in front of her face so she couldn't see anything, but it wasn't working at all.  Not at all. She was beet red and still screaming. Jordan made the executive decision that the deeper cuts did not need stitches, and because he's a medic, he has butterfly (steri) strips under the sink in our bathroom.  We doctored her up, and the bleeding had stopped.

Thank the sweet Lord.

 Two hours after the fall, we finally got her cleaned up, bandaged and clothed.  It took another half hour to calm her down before we could even think of getting them in bed.

The next day she hardly acted like she was in pain or even remembered about what happened the night before.  She had slept like a baby and woke in a cheerful mood, and much to my anxious heart, she seemed to be doing pretty okay!

In the week following, if her 'boo' was covered or if she had a shirt on, she never made mention of it. But the moment it was exposed, she was severely self-conscious of it.  Meal times she at only with her left hand.  She would keep her right arm close to her side for protection.  At bath time, she cried the entire time.  And when it was time to rub medicine on it, the crocodile tears came.  She is strong, too.  If she doesn't want you to lift up her arm, it isn't going to happen. 

We cleaned her arm every day with hibiclens (an antiseptic wash) and applied neosporin 4-6 times a day (as many times as she would allow).

 Literally one week after the accident, her 'wounds' are healing, and she even decided to show me her 'boo' for a quick photo.  This was the first time she has been 'okay' with even so much as looking at it.

  

Thankfully this sweet girl was fine and it was a pretty minor incident, but still an incident I will remember forever.  I could hardly bear to hear her cry in fear the way she did that night.  I don't ever want that to happen again.  As careful as I think I could be, and as harmless as I think a situation is - its never enough, is it?

I'm happy to report that the glass IS fixed with promises that the fluke of a shattered shower panel won't happen again. If it does, we all know what I won't be doing, right?
Right.