Tuesday night, we had our first ER/stitches experience with one of our daughters. Sweet Pea got a hold of a snowglobe, it broke and she sliced her hand.

I was at the CPC when my phone rang (while I was with a client). I usually silence my phone while there, but that day I didn’t and God knew I needed to hear it ring.

Seeing that it was my mom immediately sent me into panic-mode because I figured since she was calling and not texting, something was up.

I was gathering a bag of baby clothes for a client so I ran to the back closet to call my mom back. And that was when she told me I needed to come home immediately so we could take Sweet Pea to the ER because she had cut her hand. (carseat was in my car)

I could not get out of there fast enough. I just wanted to see my baby for myself. I had to remind myself to drive safely so I wouldn’t get into an accident!

I got to my mom’s and Sweet Pea was sitting there on my mom’s lap with my mom’s neighbor who is a nurse. They had a washcloth wrapped around the cut and my mom was applying pressure. We headed to the ER and it was a madhouse in there. We prepared ourselves for a very long wait. A nurse even stepped out to the waiting room and made an announcement to everyone that they were swamped and the longest someone had been waiting was six hours. We had arrived at the ER at 5:45pm.

I just prayed they wouldn’t leave a baby with an open wound sitting out there for hours and they didn’t! We were there for a total of a little over 3 hours and Sweet Pea was home and tucked into bed for the night at about 9:45pm! That is the latest that girl has EVER stayed up!

She was cracking us up in the ER (among all the tears shed by all three of us – my mom went with us while my dad stayed with Little Bug until Daddy could come get her after work). We kept asking her where her boo-boo was and the turkey kept pointing at the tiny remnants of her scraped knee from when she fell on the driveway weeks ago!

Here she is pointing to her “boo-boo”, meanwhile her other hand has a gaping open wound!

She kept laying on the gurney and saying “night-night”. Poor thing was worn out!

That ER treated us so well and for that I am so thankful. The nurses and all the doctors were extremely kind. I just kept wishing I could switch places with my Sweet Pea! Her spirits overall were great during our ER visit. She would cry if we had to adjust our hold on the cut. And she would cry whenever a doctor or nurse came in our room.

And then we were both crying as I had to lay her down on the gurney on this literal straight jacket so they could basically tie her down to do the stitching. Awful because an 18 month old has NO CLUE what is going on! I had to help hold her down and hold her arm still. I had been turning my head every time the cut had to be looked at by a nurse or doctor because cuts like that make me go weak in the knees. I just can’t handle it. I knew I had to just not look so I wouldn’t end up on the floor and remain strong for Sweet Pea! (Funny how I once thought I wanted to be a nurse. Ha! That wouldn’t have gone over so well.)

I didn’t want to see the cut but I wanted more than anything to bring comfort to Sweet Pea, so I put my mouth right on her ear and did “shhhhhhhhhhhh!!” as loud as I could over her screams, with my head turned away from the stitching. It amazingly calmed her because when I would stop to catch my breath I would notice her crying intensify. I was glad that she “enjoyed” my shushing. She also kept turning to me and I could tell from the look in her eyes she was just making sure Mama was still right there. The doctor asked me if I wanted to stay in for the stitching or step out. Why do they even ask that?

I have no idea how long it took, but she got three stitches and then was all bandaged up and given a cold cup of water which she LOVED.

She finally realized where her real boo-boo was.

We got home a little after 9:30pm and I got Sweet Pea straight to bed. I wasn’t sure what kind of night we’d have but she slept right through and woke up her cheerful, smiling self in the morning!

Keeping the bandage on, clean and dry has proven to be most difficult! We’ve figured out how to keep it clean by putting a ziplock baggie over it when she eats and takes a bath. During one nap she worked to get the bandage off although I caught her before she was able to get much more than just a some gauze out from underneath. So I had to rewrap the entire bandage and put TONS of tape all over to keep it in place – hopefully!

We survived our child needing stitches! It was a scary experience for sure, but I am just so thankful it was not a major injury.

As if that drama wasn’t enough for one day, on Tuesday we also had the new house (I say ‘new’ but it is really not new, just “new” to us!) inspected and there were some big, expensive things that need to either be repaired or fixed on the house (AC/deck on the back of the house). We’ve made our list of repairs that need to be made and if the seller does not wish to fix or replace things, we will have to walk from this house.

This came as a big surprise to us, but it is what it is, and we know if this falls through….God’s just got something better! Hard to imagine anything better than that, but we don’t have the big picture and God does.

It’s in His hands and we just wait to see what the outcome will be.

I will say this week has not been much fun, at all, BUT I know things could be so much worse and His mercies are new every morning no matter what issues we are facing, big or small, so we press forward trusting in the Lord and thanking Him for his protection and faithfulness – always.

- Elaine