I was really debating with myself whether to post about what happened to Aaron's finger on New Year's Day, but ultimately, I decided that we've chronicled almost all of the other big things that have happened to our family on the blog, so I should post about Aaron's finger too.
On New Year's Day, Roger was starting up the shower for the boys. He was going to go back for towels, but the shower was already running so he wanted to close the shower door. (It's a stall shower with an aluminum door on hinges.) He didn't realize as he closed the door that Aaron put his finger in the hinged side and Aaron's finger got smashed.
It was a pretty ugly scene. Aaron's pinky finger was dangling, bleeding, etc. There was lots of crying (by multiple parties) and 3/5 of the family was wet and needed dressed. Luckily, Lauren and I had already gotten ready for the day so we didn't need to delay at all with getting out the door... to the hospital.
There are some times when your child gets hurt that you debate with yourself whether it is an ER-worthy injury. Not this time. It was clear from the second Aaron stepped out of the shower that this was going to require stitches, if nothing else.
So off we went to Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh. (Can I mention again how blessed we are to live 20 minutes...in no traffic, on a good day...from such a fabulous hospital that is specifically for children? We are so blessed.) It's amazing how quickly a family of five, of which three members are aged four and under, can get out of the house in an emergency. We did forget one important thing, a pair of shoes for Aaron, but he wasn't walking anywhere anyway. I don't think I have ever driven so fast down the parkway. We made good time, let's just leave it at that.
With the threat of needing to go to the operating room to have it repaired if he didn't cooperate, laid back Aaron stepped up to the plate and let the plastic surgeon fix his hand. (She was very pretty, dressed up, probably coming from a New Years gathering, but I resisted the urge to ask her. She came directly into his room with her fancy red pea coat, black high heeled boots, etc.)
He had to have Versed (drug) to "chill out" before she did the repair and a digital-block to numb his whole pinky finger. After that, she cleaned and sewed up the wound, using five (or four, or six, I'm not entirely sure) and wrapped it in a big gauze bandage.
Poor little guy.
It is healing well.
Coming soon? A blog post about parental guilt...how it feels when you accidentally hurt your child. And how much it hurts when your child is unable to express himself correctly and tells you over and over again how mad he is that you hurt his finger.
he looks like he's doing well in the last picture...and that had to be rough on Daddy right before he left on a trip... :( Poor Roger AND Aaron!
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