First (Minor) Emergency

The other day while we were out in the yard doing the carseat installs, Rio decided to stick something in Nolan's ear while we weren't looking. Next thing we knew, he was bleeding and dad and mom panicked. This was not a good move as Nolan was clearly ok, but this sent Rio over the edge and made her refuse to tell us what happened. After begging and pleading and threatening to take away every privilege known to man, she would not budge.

Our pediatrician's office is close by so I called. Four thousand times. At 3pm I refused to believe that none of the doctors were in the office, but either that was the case or no one was answering the phone. So instead of taking him to emerg, we decided the walk in clinic a few blocks away was in order. So I strapped him onto me (because we had no carseats in the car!) and hiked up there in the sweltering heat.

When I got to the clinic, I realized it was no longer a "walk in" and only a clinic. The office was completely empty but I was hoping there would be a doctor to take pity on me. I asked the receptionist if there was any possibility the doctor would see me, but I was met with attitude. "You do realize this isn't a walk in clinic don't you?" to which I answered "Yes, I do NOW but I obviously didn't realize that when I came here".  So this caused me to start to cry. Like burst into tears. I had a son bleeding from the ear (minimally, granted, but still from the ear); I had a 4 year old who caused this bleeding yet refused to open her mouth; and I was hot, like hotter than Hades hot. I had reached my melting point.

Thankfully the doctor decided to see us. I was a blubbering mess and even explaining the boys' history clearly did not make up for my ridiculous (in her eyes - not mine!) behaviour. I was met with a whole lot of blank stares and asked condescendingly "so has it been bleeding more than this, or just this?". I repeatedly had to tell her that my concern was not the volume of blood (dripping as opposed to gushing), but the fact that it could have been something broken off in his ear canal because our darling daughter wouldn't tell us what she'd done.

So after I calmed down she took a look and said she thought it was fine, but I should probably get it checked again in a few days. Ummm, is his ear canal ok, or is it not? I'm going to go with fine, considering he was acting ok (and two days later still is), but I would have preferred a more confident answer. So after what turned out to be a waste of my time, energy and temperature because I was really not reassured at all, I trudged home. Thankfully Nolan didn't seem to be bothered by any of it.

Turns out that the threat of daddy taking away Rio's stuffies is what did the trick and got her to break her silence while I was at the doctor. She apparently stuck a piece of paper in his ear (what?) and then tried to get it out with a pencil, supposedly the eraser end. None of this makes sense to me because I'm not sure how paper got in, or how an eraser could have caused the bleeding, but all I know is that it wasn't one of the million small sticks in our yard, so for that I'm thankful.

Not our best day - hot, traumatized, and angry. Thankfully, so far the rest of the week has brought calmer emotions and much cooler temperatures!