Dylan got stitches in his head today. I got a few more gray hairs. He’s a trooper!
Originally uploaded by coffywoman.
Poor Dylan has endured chipped front teeth, a fractured elbow, and now stitches. Yep, two of them, right on his little coconut.
We spent the night at Lola’s house since Lola was going to watch the kids for us while Tom and I ran this year’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Half in San Jose. Everything went smoothly, well kinda — Tom and I woke up early, took the Light Rail, did the race (well, poor Tom’s ankle prevented him from finishing…everyone thinks he made the right choice in not pushing through to the end), up until we came back. After we were back, Auntie Christina, Dylan, Cameron and I were playing on the bed when Cameron decided to shoot out the door and head for the stairs, so while I went chasing her, poor Dylan rolled right off of Auntie Christina’s bed and on to the hardwood floor!!!
I ran back in and passed Doodle over to Christina who’d noticed blood dripping off of Dylan’s head — not just a little blood, but a lot…like enough to glob up his shirt and mine and enough to noticeably saturate a paper towel and a cloth napkin — and our brave little Dylan was wailing and pointing to his head!
After a few minutes of ice, the bleeding finally stopped and Dylan said he started feeling better, but we thought it would be good to take him to Urgent Care to make sure he really was a-ok (the mother’s imagination goes to brain swelling, blood clots, concussion, projectile vomiting…in short, it goes wild).
By then, Dylan was back to his chatty self, but when the doc examined him, sure enough, he said Dylan needed stitches.
Dylan was really wincing (but not crying) while the doctor was scraping hair and blood away to examine the boo boo (I think this doc could have been a bit gentler, too). So, when the doctor described what would need to happen — injection to numb the area and then stitches sewn in — steri-strips were a no-go because of Dyl’s hair — I started imagining what pain Dylan would be in and how I wouldn’t be able to manage witnessing it without starting to feel faint. So, I waited for Tom and Cameron to come back and we swapped kids.
Both boys were very brave. As per usual, Dylan got the “you are such a good boy” and “you’re my best patient so far” kudos…he really is amazing. The doctor said he did much better with the stitches than even lots of grown ups (for sure, he did better than I would have done). He did not cry at. all. while he was getting his stitches! After all that, though, no sticker for Dylan!
He was such a trooper, though. When we got back to Lola’s house, we gave him some ice cream and then he was off to make like he was a train with Grandpa Mike as his passenger.
We ended our weekend with dinner and play time at Heather’s house where Taliana, after hearing of his accident, had made him a nice heart out of Hama beads….
Tomorrow, the “cool bandanna” comes off and on Tuesday, we return to the doctor to make sure the stitches are not infected. Next week, he’ll get them pulled out. I hope, in the meantime, he is not in too much pain. He’s more or less his normal and playful self, but when we adjust his “bandanna,” we know it still hurts because he winces when we scoot it up, and at bedtime tonight, he told me he didn’t want to sleep because he was worried his head would hurt–and, it did. We gave him some Tylenol to take the edge off the pain and a nice, soft pillow for him to lay his head on….I’m very, very glad — especially glad — that I get to spend some morning time with the kids tomorrow. Hopefully, it will boost Dylan’s spirits and we’ll be able to keep an eye on him to make sure he isn’t in too much pain.
