Well, we have our first really interesting story for our blog. I received a message at the office Thursday from the boys' school that there was an emergency. When I called back, they said that Joseph had gotten his finger caught in a door and someone needed to come. I wasn't overly concerned, especially since I had just talked to Cort and he was on his way to pick up the boys anyway and this seemed like something he could handle. But when I said that Cort should be there soon, the school still seemed concerned. Why, I asked, did they think it was broken? Ms. Karen replied, "Amy, the tip of his finger has been cut off." Oh.
At that moment, Cort walked in the door to the school and saw his son with his entire hand wrapped up in a bloody towel. Luckily, both Cort and I are pretty calm under pressure (although Cort is admittedly squeamish). Since you can't strap a 2-year-old with a bleeding, severed finger into a car seat and leave him alone, Joseph's teacher, Ms. Patricia, sat in the back of the truck holding Joseph's hand while Cort drove to my office to pick me up (the fingertip was in a cup of ice, so it could conveniently sit in the cup holder). I took over for Ms. Patricia, whom we left on a streetcorner downtown, and off we raced to Texas Children's Hospital. Cort even ran a bunch of red lights on the way.
Poor Joseph was screaming during most of the ride to the hospital. But Texas Children's was fabulous--or at least as fabulous as any place that you frequent only because of an emergency can be. We were ushered immediately back to the triage room (our pediatrician had called ahead). They evaluated the finger and took an x-ray to check for broken bones. (This was the first time I had the opportunity to look at it. I have to say that it looked pretty bad, because while it had cleanly cut off the tip, it mysteriously had not cut off the actual fingernail--so you could see exactly how much was missing. And it was just a bloody stump, which made it look worse.) They called for the hand surgeon and the "Child Life" specialist, the latter of whom is a person whose sole job is to comfort and entertain the children with toys, books, etc. Once Joseph got hooked up to the morphine, he had a pretty grand time for awhile.
At that moment, Cort walked in the door to the school and saw his son with his entire hand wrapped up in a bloody towel. Luckily, both Cort and I are pretty calm under pressure (although Cort is admittedly squeamish). Since you can't strap a 2-year-old with a bleeding, severed finger into a car seat and leave him alone, Joseph's teacher, Ms. Patricia, sat in the back of the truck holding Joseph's hand while Cort drove to my office to pick me up (the fingertip was in a cup of ice, so it could conveniently sit in the cup holder). I took over for Ms. Patricia, whom we left on a streetcorner downtown, and off we raced to Texas Children's Hospital. Cort even ran a bunch of red lights on the way.
Poor Joseph was screaming during most of the ride to the hospital. But Texas Children's was fabulous--or at least as fabulous as any place that you frequent only because of an emergency can be. We were ushered immediately back to the triage room (our pediatrician had called ahead). They evaluated the finger and took an x-ray to check for broken bones. (This was the first time I had the opportunity to look at it. I have to say that it looked pretty bad, because while it had cleanly cut off the tip, it mysteriously had not cut off the actual fingernail--so you could see exactly how much was missing. And it was just a bloody stump, which made it look worse.) They called for the hand surgeon and the "Child Life" specialist, the latter of whom is a person whose sole job is to comfort and entertain the children with toys, books, etc. Once Joseph got hooked up to the morphine, he had a pretty grand time for awhile.
Eventually, the hand surgeon showed up. I was a little wary when we discovered that his older brother had been a few years below me in law school. Was this guy old enough to be operating on my son? (Apparently so, and an even younger medical student did much of the operation.) The surgeon showed us the severed tip (this was the first time I'd looked at it). There was a bunch of tissue, a little tiny bit of bone, and the nail bed, in addition to the skin. He said that the nail bed won't regenerate and the whole thing could not be sewed back on, but instead he took out the bone and most of the tissue (leaving only enough for cushion) and sewed the skin over the open wound. He said it was 50/50 whether it will live or die. If we get lucky and it lives, then we just have to wait for it to heal. If it dies, he'll have to have another surgery to graft more tissue on it. Either way, he's going to have a short finger.
Joseph did fine with the surgery--since he was knocked out for it--but had a tough time coming out of the sedation. He got sick and generally didn't want to wake up, so he was a pretty miserable kid for a couple of hours. But he perked up when we finally left, and was very anxious to see Charlie.
So where was Charlie, you ask? We had called our friend Mike Bennett, whose daughter Cate is the same age as the boys, and Mike picked Charlie up at school. Apparently Charlie didn't think this was weird at all, and he happily went home with Mike and spent the evening with Mike, Shelley, and Cate. They were nice enough to report in periodically that he had found all the balls in the house, had eaten all his beef burgundy but none of his vegetables, and enjoyed a bath with Cate. He went to sleep over there in a pair of Cate's pajamas (thanks, Shelley, for not giving him pink ones). They luckily had an extra binkie we'd left over there, but he still had to go to sleep without his dog, blankie, and book. He did great. So great, in fact, that he apparently called Shelley and Mike "Mommy" and "Daddy" all night. We were happy you fared so well without us, Charlie, but that's going a little overboard.
We picked Charlie up on our way home with Joseph and got them home and to bed around 11pm. Everyone slept great. Joseph cried for awhile the next morning--not sure if his finger hurt, he still felt sick from the sedation, or was just supertired--but since then he's been back to his old self. He's got a big bandage on his finger, which we usually cover with a sock to keep it clean and keep him from perpetually flipping everyone the bird.
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