Our First Trauma

We had our first major accident with Nicholas last night. We have a shoe rack by our front door. It is made of fake wood (IKEA) and Nicholas likes to pull all the shoes out of it and stuff them in different places in the rack, or stuff them all into one place. He also likes to climb on it, and sit on it.

So last night, he was running towards the shoe rack, and away from me (I was crawling after him, pretending to be a monster - the things we do for our kids). He slipped, and fell. His nose hit the shoe rack first, then his head. He broke out in the loudest wails I have heard in a long time. His nose started bleeding, and he was so sensative - you couldn't even take a warm washcloth and clean him up. He just wanted to be held.

He calmed down in about 20 minutes, so I didn't think there was anything that wrong. We cleaned him up (just a little). As a side note, if you want to see a kid squirm and know how strong they are, just try and wipe Nicholas' nose after he has hit it, or really anytime. He likes to try and blow snot bubbles, because he saw a kid at church do it, so now it is his new task in life.

The bleeding stopped, and he went to bed a little later than normal, but not too late. At 10:30 he woke up wailing. His nose was swollen, and all purple. I thought I had misjudged matters, so I called Kaiser. Who gave a variation on the classic "Take two tylenol and call me in the morning if nothing changes." They said, "Give him Tylenol and we will see you in the morning at 9:30 at the doctor's office." So eventually he got back to bed. When he woke up again at 1:30 - which is the time the Tylenol wears off - his nose was still all gross and weird looking.

But this morning, he seemed fine. He would touch his nose and then whine a little, but other than that, and a little swelling, he seemed fine. We went to the doctor anyways. Besides the doctor telling me that a size 8 was too big a shoe for him (and changing her mind after she had check him out - this wasn't our normal pediatrician), she tried to touch his nose. Wow!!! The fit that occured was horrid. They had to give him a little sedative so he would calm down and let her touch him.

The verdict is that he has "moved" some of the cartilidge in his nose. It turns out that toddlers - well this young at least - don't have a bone in their nose to break. It is just cartilidge. So he "moved" some, but when she looked inside, it didn't appear that there was any structural problems. Although she had a hard time finding where the bump was on his nose because he was still swollen. I have been told to keep an eye on it and that if it looks crooked, to go back. But otherwise, there doesn't appear to have been serious structural damage.

However, he has these black circles under his eyes, like he hasn't slept in 4 days. I was told those might get worse before they get better.

But Nicholas is healing, and I think he has forgotten all about the problem, because he slammed his nose into the couch. He cried a little, but it didn't seem to phase him that much. So - hopefully - this is the only trauma we have with him. At least until he starts playing sports.