They ate their dinner quickly, and ran down to play at the park. I followed them down with the baby, and Daddy was close behind. Mommy, Daddy, and Grandpa were visiting on the sidelines when we heard someone hollering. It didn't sound like either of ours, but unfortunately, when I turned to look, it was Eliott rolling around on the ground in pain. I ran over to scoop him up quickly, but it was obvious that the pain was pretty severe. He didn't want to cause a big scene, and wasn't screaming loudly, but he was in so much pain he couldn't stay still, and just kept on saying, "it hurts, it hurts, it really hurts..."
I was almost in tears, I felt so bad for him. Some friends came by to check him out, and after about 5 minutes, it was obvious that we needed to take him in. Hi elbow was swelling, and seemed to be hanging a little funny.
For some odd reason I had happened to grab a bottle of milk from the fridge on my way out of the door for Ruby. My aunt was just coming off of the golf course in her golf cart. We had her grab the girls- as Ruby was getting hungry, and she took them back to her house for what we thought would be a few hours.
Daddy sat in the back with Eliott. He could not move his arm at all or he was wincing in pain. I stopped at Subway to grab a bag of ice to put on it for the 15 minute ride to the hospital.
-We noticed when we got to the hospital that he didn't even have shoes on...oh well!-
They quickly ushered us in to a room, got him on the monitor, and put some ice on his sore elbow. Poor little buddy was just miserable. The doctor came in, asked how it happened (darn monkey bars...), and right away ordered up an x-ray.
He was nervous to get the x-rays taken, because it hurt so bad to move his arm. He was in lots of pain, but was a trooper. They had to take the x-rays in 3 different positions.
The x-rays determined that his elbow was cracked, and the 'elbow ball' had fallen out of socket. She said he would required surgery. I kind of lost it, and had to step out of the room. I never thought it would be this bad. We lucked out with the best orthopedic surgeon in the area being the one on call that night. He came in at about 9:00 p.m. to meet with Chad and I. He took us into the office and showed us the x-ray on the computer. He explained the procedure. He would need to pop the 'elbow ball' back into place, then hold it there with 2 pins. We could have opted out of the surgery, and he would have healed, but he would always have what they call 'gun-stock' arm. We didn't want this for our 5 year old, so we opted for the surgery. He said it was a good choice. The anesthesiologist came in at about 10 p.m. to start his IV, phone calls were made to make arrangements for the girls. What we thought would be a couple of hours, had now turned into an overnight stay. I needed my baby or my breast pump, and some other essentials. Chad's Dad was already with us, his Mom went to get the girls and took them back to her house (thank goodness I had already started storing up milk for her), my parents stopped at our house to grab some things for us, and then came to the hospital just in time for the surgeon to come out an report how it went.
Surgery only lasted about 15 minutes, I'll spare you the details on what they use to make the holes that they insert the pins into! Dr. Jorgenson came out to report that it went very well! We were happy, we were relieved, and we couldn't wait to see him. They took us up to the 3rd floor, which happens to be labor and delivery, along with the ICU, which is where he would spend the night. Ironic that I was back on the same floor where I delivered a baby 6 weeks ago. I had some overwhelming emotions about everything going on, but we managed on through it. They kept him in recovery until the anesthesia wore off. Then we were finally allowed to see him!
This is how he looked....Poor little guy....
At this point he was feeling good, and had no pain. They needed to keep him overnight so they could check his pulse, and make sure there was no significant swelling in his fingers. He didn't sleep the best that first night, but that's to be expected when the nurse is popping in every hour to check! By the morning he was doing well, and at 7 a.m. we were begging to be released!
He thought it was pretty neat that he got a ride out of the hospital in a wheel chair. We were happy to see that smile!
He was put into a temporary cast for 1 week. Then we needed to go back in to have another x-ray taken to make sure it was all in the right place. They would then put on a hard cast.
My cousin and her family lives next door, and they stopped by with a cute little stuffed teddy who also had a broken left arm. Eliott snuggled right up to him.
We still went up to the cabin, and the broken arm didn't slow him down a bit. Daddy made him a fishing rod that he could use with one arm...it even worked! He's quite the little fisherman!
We had our niece's graduation party, and we couldn't keep him off of the trampoline!
There's one of his fish! He figured out how to use his teeth to reel in his line!
By the time the week was done this thing had had it! It was unraveling, and filthy!!!
Mommy took him in by herself...big mistake....we had no idea what we would find under there!
Ughhhh....I about lost it when I saw this....He was quite nervous himself. He knew they had to come out somehow, and you could tell this bothered him a bit.
The x-ray looked good, so we got the go-ahead for the hard cast. He got to choose his favorite color
The nurse who put it on was lots of fun!
He was pretty proud of his bright green cast!
We filled it up with names and I Love You's!
It didn't slow him down at all. He was even swimming with it one, but then we got nervous about the lake water getting in where the pins were, so we made him stop.
He got a cute painted face at the Platte Lake picnic:
He only had the green cast for 2 weeks, and it was time to take it off again! He was pretty excited!
The cutter was really loud, so they made him wear ear muffs! He was a bit excited to be getting it off!
I had Daddy come with this time, because I knew what we were going to see under there! Ughhh...
Dr. Jorgenson checked over the x-ray again, and decided that it was good to go! No numbing required, Dr. took a pliers and just tugged those things right out!
And there they were....oh, my!!!! We couldn't believe the size of those things! He put a band aid over the holes, and said he was good to go! No lake water for 7 days, and be a little careful!
This is one proud, brave little boy! And, boy, I hope we don't have to go through this again!
I didn't take a picture of the initial break, but this is how it looked when we were ready to get the cast removed. The picture on the right shows how the pins had to hold the ball in place. When the break happened the ball had fallen down and wasn't sitting where it should be. The Dr. said that is actually what had caused him so much pain. We are so thankful for the great surgeon we had. Other than a couple tiny little scars from the pins...he is as good as new!
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