The Swarts Family Blog

On Friday we had a bit of an incident involving Isaac.  He and Ivy were playing 'chasey' around the apartment when he tripped and fell, hitting his head on the coffee table.  I looked over as he started crying and holding his hand to his head, above his right eyebrow.  As he pulled his hand away, blood gushed everywhere. I rushed over and I could see there was a deep cut there.  I quickly pressed his head against my chest, into my shirt to stop the bleeding and carried him to the laundry to get a towel.  I pressed the towel to his head and quickly ran Aran saying, "Please come home, Isaac's hit his head on the coffee table, I think he needs stitches."  Aran replied, "leaving now."  (Luckily he only works ten-ish minutes away, otherwise I think I would have called Gina).  I was pressing the towel to his wound, and could see that the bleeding was stopping.  I risked a look and yep, he would definitely need stitches, I thought. I got him to hold the towel to his head as I changed my clothes and packed my bag with alien cards etc, (and a water bottle, last time we were at the hospital we had to wait 3+ hours and we got so thirsty).  Aran came home and kindly drove us to the hospital (Isaac thought it was great that he sat in the front with me - I didnt want to take the pressure off the towel on his wound, and the hospital is a short walk away). Aran went back home with Ivy as she was tired and we thought we'd be in for the long haul again.  However the nurse took one look and sent us straight to the room where they do fix-ups.  As we were sitting there a male nurse came -and after poking and prodding, of course I had to look and it was pretty gruesome - and said that they needed a plastic surgeon to fix it as it was quite deep.  However, all the plastic surgeons were in a seminar til late evening (it was currently 2.30pm) and they thought it better not to wait. So he explained where this Plastic Surgeon was (In new downtown about 25 mins away) and said they were expecting us.  In the meantime they wanted to dress the wound.  So they cleaned it up with the 'owie' disinfectant (I think this bit hurt the most!) and shoved some gauze deep into the wound and bandaged it on top.

Aran came back to pick us up and we all went to the Plastic Surgery office.  As we were waiting in the waiting room the surgeon's assistant came over to have a look at it - she did a massive gasp! Aran and I were not impressed as it scared Isaac! It became clear then that it was pretty bad.  Isaac and I went through to the surgeon who had a good look, then they had a big discussion.  The English speaking nurse said they weren't sure if they could just stitch it as it was very deep exposing the bone.  They weren't sure if it needed more work.  To help make the decision they checked Isaac's vitals, brain function etc and he was fine so they decided to go ahead with it.  They laid a blanket over the bed and laid Isaac onl it, then folded it over him, like a straight jacket.  They also put a sheet of material with one hole in it over his face so his right eye couldn't see what they were doing.  Here they sent me out the room, because in their experience the children are more worked up when the mothers are there.  Poor Isaac! and poor me having to wait outside while he was moaning 'mummy, mummy'.  About 10 mins later they called me back in and dressed the wound and gave me instructions for care etc. Isaac was very glad to see me and told me "I was so disappointed you weren't in the room." Funny kid with his big words!

So we have to go back on Monday to get the dressing changed, then on Wednesday to see if the stitches are ready to come out. Fun, Fun!

When we got home (6.30pm) I cleaned Isaac up as he had dried blood everywhere, including heaps in his right ear. The adrenaline wore off and I was quite shaky. But as I told myself, I'm sure its the first of many similar incidents! :)

Here is a picture of Isaac today taken with his big 'owie!'

Yesterday it was quite swollen, but today it has all gone down which is good.