The Tale of the Deadly Kazoo

Yesterday probably ranks up there with one of the yuckiest days we've had. Ever. It started with a holiday photo session that didn't involve a lot of cooperation from 3 out of my 4 kids. Sigh. And ended with a 6 hour visit to the peds ER at Duke. Let me fill you in.

After naps we decided to go the playground in our neighborhood. The girls all rode their bikes and I pushed Jacob in the stroller. In the stroller we found a kazoo leftover from the neighborhood Halloween party. I gave it to Jacob to hold and play with while we walked. At the playground the girls took off playing and Jacob swung for a while. Then he was done and wanted to walk around. I let him, not really paying attention to the fact that he had the kazoo in his hand. Since he's a relatively new walker he falls. A lot. So he's walking and falls but this time the cry is different..I immediately pick him up and I notice the kazoo in his left hand and that his eyes are clinched shut. Then I notice the blood. Then I put 2 and 2 together....Uh-Oh! So I start walking back to the stroller blotting the blood with my shirt because I am unprepared and not that mom that always has her diaper bag. And I start to panic a little because it's his eye. And it's bleeding. A lot. So I start screaming for the girls to get on their bikes that we have got to go. Now! I call Paul, who wasn't home, as we are walking home and casually inquire as to his whereabouts. I tell him Jacob hit his eye and I think I need to take him to the Pediatric Urgent Care..which just so happens to be about 5 min. away. He is, thankfully, very close to home. In fact he beats us home from the park. The 2 year old on the big wheel slowed me down.

Paul has the van ready for me. And I whisk Jacob away to the Pediatric Express (who, by the way, could not have been nicer...they are great). As I'm driving I'm thinking all kinds of terrible things like he's going to be blind because he fell on a freaking plastic kazoo. But then I think..no..it's just a surface wound..I'm just being overly cautious because it's his eye. When we get to the dr they see me right away. The dr. looks at the eye for about 2 secs and immediately says we should go to the ER. She thinks it may have lacerated the eye muscle and possibly the tear duct so it might need some repair that she's not equipped to do. She recommends Duke since they'll have an eye doc and plastic surgeons on call. Now I really start freaking out. It was just a plastic kazoo!!

So I call Paul and he arranges for childcare so he can go with me to the ER. Thank God for great neighbors (Belinda!!) and for my mother in law. I had no idea what to expect at the ER..I had visions we'd walk in and there'd be a 100 people there in masks with the Swine Flu. Thankfully when we got there it didn't appear to be too busy and I only saw 1 person in a mask. We got a room pretty quickly but had to wait a long time to see the eye doctors. To make this long story a little shorter I'll summarize a bit: waited to see eye doc #1..saw him..he couldn't decide how bad it was..waited more..saw eye doc #2...she thought it potentially hit the tear duct and might need stitches but she wasn't sure..waited some more...saw eye doc #3..he thought the same thing as #2. Basically they had to sedate Jacob to really examine the eye. So finally after 4 hours of waiting they come in do the procedure. Which was really scary. Really, really scary..I was a nervous wreck during the whole thing. There are few harder things than watching your child, especially when they are little, go through medical producers. The outcome was good..very good. The tear ducts were not damaged and no stitches were needed. Phew. Praise God! It took Jacob a little bit to come out of the sedation but overall he did fabulous. He was such a trooper.

It was a long, long night. We were at the ER for over 6 hours. They could not have been nicer though. And I was impressed that the eye doc called us today to check on Jacob. His eye is a little red and swollen but near as bad as it could be. In fact the situation could have been much different. I am so, so thankful for the outcome we had. Thanks dear friends for your prayers and support! A long scary night but at least it turned out good.