Emily's 3rd ER visit in 3 years...

We seem to be averaging out to 1/year, although trips 1 and 2 occurred in the same night, just different hospitals. Oddly enough, all 3 have been to ER's that are far away from our house (like hours and hours).

This weekend was YAR, which is a big youth retreat we take our kids to every year. Chuck and I are part of the leadership team and this year I decided to take a personal day so we could go down and help get ready on Friday. Friday afternoon Em and I were getting ready to go from one building to another so I went into a side room to grab our coats. Em came running towards me as I was holding open the door, and as she typically does, got to running to fast and fell forward. Unfortunately this time, she broke her fall with the edge of the door and her head. I quick scooped her up and went to find Chuck. At this point I was thinking it was a "simple" goose egg to the forward and a very scared little girl. Once I found Chuck we pulled her off my shoulder to exam her face and were shocked to see it covered in blood! We had no idea where the blood was coming from so we started to wipe it off and discovered a decent size gash on her forehead. By this point Gma Peggy had come in and immediately took charge (cause she is amazing like that!) She took Em to the sink and ran her hands under cold water (apparently this calms children down...who knew?), so we could better exam her forehead. Upon further examination Peggy says "if it were my child, I would take her to the ER". Umm...you don't have to qualify that Peggy..if you say take her, we will take her, no questions asked. I see in Chuck's brain he is trying to figure out how he is going to get everything done that he needs to have ready for the night session, fortunately our friend Susie also notices this and offers to go with me. It's a good thing she did...I'm not sure I could have done the ER trip on my own.

We get to the ER and upon seeing Em's bleeding forehead they quickly get us checked in and into a room. It isn't too much longer the dr. comes in to exam her. He seemed to be a good dr. but definitely not a pediatric specialist! He says definitely stitches, as well as x-rays to rule out whiplash. We wait about 30-45 min. for the xray tech during which Em falls asleep, since all this drama occurred very close to nap time. We wheel her to the xray room and Susie graciously agrees to stay with her, since I couldn't. Susie and the 2 techs do a fabulous job of getting Em calm and cooperative in a very scary place for a 3 year old.
We head back to the room and are told it will probably be 15-20 min. because the x-rays have to be sent to Springfield to be read. Finally the dr. comes back in and is ready to do the stitches. It takes a nurse, Susie and I to hold her, and there is lots of screaming from one unhappy little girl. After 4 stitches the dr. says we are good to go, and tells the nurse to stick some neosporin and a band-aid on it before sending us on our way. I am pretty sure they had to go to the store to buy the band-aids, because this seemed to take way longer than it should have. But finally the nurse comes back. She also brings steri-strip with her, and asks "are you planning on taking the stitches out yourself?" Ummm....no!?! Apparently the dr. somehow got the impression we would be....nope..definitely taking her back to a dr. for that procedure!
Once Em gets her band-aid it is off to Dairy Queen for some ice cream to make everything all better! By the next morning you wouldn't have any idea Em had stitches in her forehead the way she is bouncing around! We go to Dr. Petre on Weds. for a follow-up and hopefully to remove the stitches.

Here are some pictures of our excitement--


Waiting in the ER...not a happy girl!


Several hours later back at camp sporting a pink bandaid!


The next day sans band-aid...our happy girl is back!