Saturday night Charlotte prayed, "Thank you for this not hot day."
The evening of August 28th was a busy one.
After dinner we got Riley off to choir and Todd off to a basketball game for the Owensboro Corporate Challenge.
At seven o'clock I sent Charlotte and Macie out in the backyard to play while I got Carv ready for bed. As soon as I came downstairs Macie came running in sobbing saying that Charlotte pushed her off the trampoline. My heart broke. I could tell just by the way she was holding her left arm that it was probably broken. I cuddled her for a minute while I tried to get to the bottom of yet another sibling induced injury.
Macie was cursing Charlotte through her tears.
"Macie, calm down. I am sure it was an accident."
"No! She took both hands and shoved me off the trampoline like THIS," she explained as she demonstrated the calculated, intentional push.
My eyes turned to Charlotte. As soon as mine met hers she broke down in guilty sobs.
Once both girls had calmed down a bit I told Macie we should go get her arm x-rayed.
But she wasn't gonna have any of that. She DID NOT want to go to the doctor.
Given how Todd was gone, Carver was in bed, and we would have to go to the Emergency Room since it was after seven, I asked her if she just wanted to go to bed and then go to the doctor in the morning.
Now...I realize this sounds horrible, but my decision came after she was done crying and said it only hurt a little. She had complete range of motion in the arm and hand and I couldn't feel or see anything out of place. It didn't even swell. But still, that first moment when she came in I had that feeling...
The next morning she woke up and said it was fine! Didn't even hurt! Then she proceeded to dress herself while only using her right arm. And she is a lefty. She confirmed that she didn't want to go to the doctor. I sent her off to school and told her I would come in a couple of hours to take her in for x-rays. (Because, once again, school starts before any of the urgent care places are open!)
When I arrived at school Macie was in PE so I got to chat with her teacher a bit. Her teacher explained that she was totally fine. She hadn't said a word. She had been writing with it and was in PE and nothing was wrong. I explained Macie's irrational fear of the doctor and x-rays and how part of me wondered if it was all a cover up...but her teacher pretty much convinced me to leave her there.
I interrogated Macie about it when she got home. She said it was fine, but it did hurt when one boy squeezed her arm. All that led to was a bunch of questions from me trying to figure out why some boy was squeezing her arm. (She had some really random injuries from boys at school last year.)
The incident was all but forgotten. There was a time the next week when I noticed her favoring it and when Todd said he noticed it too, so I had her come in again, move it around and even do a push up to show us it was ok. Seemed good.
Fast forward twelve days later. While playing outside Carver apparently squeezed Macie's arm above the left wrist and she came in holding it that way again. That was it. We were going for x-rays. Macie was sobbing when we arrived at Community Care. Not because of pain, but because she DID NOT want to get x-rays or a cast. I tried my hardest to explain how it was easy, fun, and exciting, but she wasn't buying any of it.
X-rays came back. Clearly broken. They wanted to do a hard cast, but I got them to go with a splint since we would have to go to the orthopedic specialist in a couple of days anyway.
And because Macie was horrified.
We tried desperately to convince her that casts are awesome. You can get cool colors, you can write on them - again, nothing was working.
The orthopedic specialist said we could continue with the hard splint (which also immobilizes her thumb) or we could go with a hard cast that just goes up to her wrist (making it so much easier to use her hand for oh, I don't know, things like writing!).
She wouldn't budge.
Good news, though. Since we waited almost two weeks after the break to go to the doctor, she would probably only have to wear the splint for two more! :)
This all made me wonder about Macie and her pain tolerance. When we got the first x-ray the doctor at Community Care looked at me, raised his eyebrow and said, "Usually when this happens kids come in right away because it is so painful." Not in an amazed-at-Macie's-ability-to-withstand-pain kind of way, but more in a wow-I-can't-believe-you-didn't-bring-your-poor-child-in-sooner kind of way.
I think Macie has special super powers. When she was two she sat on the hot muffler of a motorcycle and got third degree burns on the back of her legs. We had to go to a wound clinic where they would peel the dead, burned skin off of her legs with tweezers. The nurses commented every time we went how amazing she was. They specifically explained it as so painful that grown men would scream and yell, yet little Macie just lay there on that table without a move or sound.
So yeah, she is a tough little bugger.
Aside from neglecting my children's medical needs, we have also been doing cross country.
Macie runs in the K-2 division. I think all the elementary schools in the city and county are invited, but it seems like about only 6 or 7 are really represented. I would guess that 200 or so kids run. She has placed 11th and 13th out of all the girls. The top ten in each division get a special ribbon and his or her name announced on the podium, so she is so close!
She is just a wee bit taller than her classmates.
Riley runs in the 3rd-5th division. While she gets almost the exact same time as Macie, it usually has her coming in around 35th or 40th for the girls her age. At the first race she ran 6 min 20 seconds. She made a goal to run 5 seconds faster and she did! She ran this in 6 min 14 seconds!
The City of Owensboro just completed revamping part of the riverfront. The Ohio River is the border between Kentucky and Indiana and our downtown area is right on it. They did a great job! It is an excellent park with fountains, a splash pad, toys galore, swings overlooking the river, concert areas, walking paths and more.
Waiting to see barges.
Also, just to be accountable, I started a 12 week health challenge on Monday. Kind of Body-For-Life because I try to eat 6 times a day with lots a protein, but not really cause I'm not doing any heavy weights. I'm doing more metabolic resistance training and HIIT, but I've been thinking about getting a gym membership so I can hit the weights. We will see.
