Well, plans changed early Sunday morning when Haley came screaming and crying into my room with a tiny bit of a toothpick sticking out of her foot. I picked her up onto the sink counter and Ritch pulled the toothpick out but it was not a whole toothpick. A little less than an inch was missing and we had no way of knowing if the toothpick was whole when it went into her foot. So, we picked her up and took her to the emergency room. We arrived at the ER at 8:30am. They were not busy so took her right back. She went to x-ray (which would not show wood) then to CAT scan (which showed an opacity) so they assumed there was more wood in Haley's foot. The orthopedic surgeon was called and since he had a couple more cases, Haley couldn't have surgery until 5pm.
Haley posed for this picture. They hooked her up to antibiotics and a saline drip since she could not have anything to eat before surgery. At 5pm they took her down to the OR. When talking to the anesthesiologist he let us know Haley would need general anesthesia because she had eaten some pretzels at 11am but if we waited another two hours, she could be sedated instead. We chose to wait.
Here we are waiting.
The anesthesiologist came in around 7pm. He asked Haley if she was afraid and she said, "A little."
He told her he had a little "liquid courage" in his pocket then put some in her IV and told her she'd have a big smile on her face in 10 sec. Ten seconds later, there came the smile and giggles so they wheeled her away. Haley's surgery went well. She was a champ! An hour later she was out. They hadn't found the almost one inch piece of wood but looked all around where it might possibly have been. They took out some small splinters and bits of tissue that had been damaged, stitched her up, and she came out.
It was almost 9:30pm before we got home. Haley was excited to use her crutches and very hungry. She had a nice block in her foot so slept well all night until about 5:30am. I gave her pain meds and she couldn't fall back to sleep so we got up. She made it the rest of the day with only Aleve. She did her school work on the couch with her foot up, figured out "having" to use crutches is not as fun as she thought it might be, and practiced violin sitting in a chair with her foot up.
We figured out how to wrap her foot in plastic and got her a bath. She had more pain last night so I gave her another strong pill before bed. This morning she woke up happy...saying she could feel her toes again. She has another day with no weight bearing then tomorrow she can start putting weight on the foot.
She will be good as new in no time!
1 comment:
WOW! It's good they got everything out. I know somebody who had a thorn in her arm for two decades, that finally got infected.
P.S. I'm now hiding the toothpicks from my children....
Post a Comment