The Accident

Realized I haven't posted anything about Michaela's 'little' accident last Thursday. We went to a friend's house to swim after I got off work at the health department. There was a slide and Hunter headed right to it. He was so excited - it was his first time swimming in the deep end w/o a lifejacket and he was doing really well. Michaela saw Hunter go down the slide and she wanted to go down too. My friend asked if I thought Michaela would be less scared on someone's lap. I told her I didn't think Michaela would be scared. I was more worried about her falling off the ladder. So, we were taking turns w/ someone helping her up the ladder, then someone waiting in the pool at the bottom of the slide for her. She had the biggest smile on her face each time she came down the slide then popped up out of the water!

At one point, I was helping her up the ladder. She was maybe two rungs up. I looked away for 1/2 a second to see where Hunter was and before I knew it Michaela slipped and I just couldn't seem to move fast enough to catch her! She fell on her back (she was wearing a lifejacket), then her head hit the cement! I felt ill to my stomach as my worst fear was coming true before my very eyes! She began crying very loudly and as I picked her up, she threw up all down the front of my swimsuit. Not good. I called the doctor's office and the nurse told me that their protocol said I needed to take her to the ER. She may have just swallowed a lot of pool water and she was crying pretty hard. But I knew we couldn't take any chances.

My friend offered to keep Hunter. (You would think it was the greatest day of Hunter's life! He's still talking about how he got to stay at his friend's house and have dinner!) I quickly put on some dry clothes and raced Michaela to the ER, calling Allan along the way. (As luck would have it, I forgot Michaela's change of clothes at home. I had to throw on a T-shirt of Hunter's that was in the car! What a look - a pull up and oversized T-shirt. I can only imagine what the staff was thinking.) I got worried as Allan arrived b/c she began to act very sleepy. I called my friend who had kept her during the day to see if she had taken a decent nap while Allan got her some Bugles out of the vending machine. She had napped well and now I had managed to worry another friend w/ the news we were in the ER! (I purposely didn't post anything to Facebook until we got home.) Michaela seemed to perk up after the Bugles.

We finally got called back. It seemed like one person after another just kept coming in and asking the same questions. What time was the accident? What happened? I wanted to ask, "Didn't the last person remember to write that on the chart?" I'm guessing in cases like this, though, they have to rule out abuse and probably want to make sure the story doesn't change. I also couldn't help but think that we had gotten seen more promptly for Michaela's split chin back in October, which had quit bleeding by the time we got to the hospital.

My friend called and offered to bring Michaela some dinner. The nurses said it would be okay if she had a little. Michaela was gobbling up chicken and rice as the nurse practitioner walked in. She said the fact that Michaela was hungry was a good sign, but just to be on the safe side they needed to run a CT Scan. I sent Allan to go get Hunter and take him home to bed.

Michaela had a fit about lying on the table for the scan and the technician told me it would be easier if she was asleep. Since it was well past bedtime at this point, I told her that wouldn't be a problem. Nearly 5 hours after we arrived, we finally left the ER w/ a clear CT Scan and, other than a knot on the head, a healthy baby girl! Mama has been very paranoid ever since, and Michaela seems to be a little accident prone, but she has not shown any ill signs!