Growing Paines { 5 }: Stitches

It was that moment every parent dreads... Your child starts crying suddenly, and you know it's the cry that means they're hurt.

On January 31st, I heard that cry from Allie, and it signaled our first experience with a more serious injury than a scrap or a bump.

Allie had been running inside and had fallen against a chair with a wooden railing, which ripped open the skin under her nose. At first I saw blood gushing and thought she broke her nose. But after looking closer, I realized that the skin underneath was deeply cut, and knew she was going to need stitches.

Ugh.

This was our very first experience having to take one of the kids to get stitched up, and thankfully it happened at the best possible time. One of the teens from church was already at our house playing with the kids while I did housework, so we could leave Silas and Rowan in her care as we took Allie to the urgent care center. And Nate was working from home that day, so he was able to patch up Allie's cut for the drive, and more importantly, go with us. That was huge, because I don't think I could have handled it by myself. I was shaking the whole time.

We went to the Premier Urgent Care center in Limerick, and the people were great there. We were able to get in quickly and get Allie taken care of it fast. I think we were only there for two hours, and it was a late Friday afternoon into the early evening. The place was packed by the time we left at 7pm.

The worst part was that Allie had to be wrapped up in a sheet for the procedure, so that she wouldn't move around too much or try to touch the wound while the physician's assistant was putting in the stitches. And she had to get several shots in the area of the wound to numb it. So she cried through the whole thing (you could even hear her outside in the waiting room where I was) but the stitches came out great, and afterward Allie was talking about how gentle the doctor was and how nice she was. She was very brave through the whole thing! Allie continues to amaze us.

Now it's been almost 4 weeks later, and the wound is healing beautifully. We're putting silicone gel and vitamin E on the scar to minimize it, but it already looks much better.

Allie still tells people about when she fell and hit the chair and mommy and daddy had to take her to the doctor to get stitches. In fact yesterday she told complete strangers at Silas' speech therapy office. I guess the memory will stick with her for a long time!

Here are a couple pictures, mostly from Nate's camera. After they put the stitches in, the nurses gave Allie a blue popsicle and a blue lollipop, so she was very happy.