Sweet Pea and the ER

With hands shaking from nerves, I had to take my precious Sweet Pea to the ER yesterday. I was nervous b/c a) she was hurt and b) the last time we took her to the ER (at 14 months of age with a broken leg from a freak fall off her changing table, and how we discovered her low bone density) she was taken away from us by DCF and I was accused to snapping my precious little girl's leg like a twig (and even some people close to me doubted my side of the story, siding with the ER Dr. to add insult to injury).

Sweet Pea was playing with my friend's youngest daughter (Blog link SAHM and Air Force Wife). We don't know if they got mad, or the play simply got out of hand, but some how Sweet Pea ended up being pushed into the desk and cutting open her eye lid just below her eye brow. It didn't bleed all that much, but when I got her eye cleaned up and the blood down to just an ooze I realized the cut was deeper than a scratch and needed medical attention. I called our ped's off and had him paged to find out where he wanted us to take her (he has hospital privileges at one of the hospitals in the area) and he said to just take her to the local ER (not his hospital). My friend dropped off me and the kids (DH was at Busch Gardens w/ the car and car seats) and DH met us at the ER. We were in and out in an hour, and thankfully the ANRP who treated Heather was so thrilled that I am a Lactation Consultant that she was more interested in asking my opinion on tongue tie in a baby (her grand son) and viewed me as a professional peer (just with a different specialty) so she never questioned Heather's injury. That was my biggest fear: that b/c the injury could easily have been received by a hard slap or punch out of aggression that I would, once again, fall under the suspicious eye of Dr's and DCF.

I was right in taking her though. She needed her cut glued shut. She never whimpered, just asked questions about what was going on, and watched TV the whole time. She was SUCH a big girl and I was (and am) SO proud of her!

Oh, and FWIW, I was able to back up the ANRP's concerns and agree that with tongue tie to the level she's describing it needs to be clipped. For those interested, tongue tie can cause much more damage to a baby than just cause problems breast feeding. It can cause the palate of the mouth to become misshapen, or not shape properly, which can restrict or compromise blood flow to the teeth and not only cause crooked teeth, but even cause teeth to die off and leading to false teeth and bridges. There's much more in play than just breastfeeding.

So, today my little girl has a nice shiner and glued eye to show off her fun times with her friends. And yes, she's already asking to go play with her friend again. My girl, the social butterfly like her mama!