Weekends are always, er, interesting, with Michael around. For the uninitiated, Michael is our 56 pound two-year old who is outgrowing his size 5 clothes.
Last weekend it was a trip to the hospital after his sister Erin hurt his wrist. I didn’t see what happened. Amazingly, neither did Jamie (age 4) who was sitting right next to him or Catherine (age 12) who was in the next room, about ten feet away. But I heard the crying and came in to find Michael sitting backwards in his chair, holding his arm in pain, with Erin standing next to him. Neither Erin (age 9, with Down Syndrome) nor Michael, who has a vocabulary of about five words) was going to tell me.
Neither Amy nor I are medically trained, but we felt the arm and didn’t detect any obvious fractures, so we decided to give Michael some children ibuprofen and wait until morning. Well, Michael whimpered in pain all night, threw up once, and in the morning had a slight fever. There was no discoloration, but maybe some slight swelling, so we decided that I should take him to the hospital. Even though it wasn’t exactly an emergency, urgent care wasn’t open, so off we went to the ER, with Michael still holding his arm, refusing to use it.
What amazed me was when the doctor came in to look at him. She started by feeling his shoulder, then worked her way down to his elbow and wrist. I expected him to cry out in pain when she probed his wrist, but he just sat there passively. After X-rays, we returned to the examination room, and Michael was using his right hand as if nothing had ever happened! I guess we can kiss that deductible good bye!
Then comes the weekend just past. Catherine, the aforementioned 12 year-old, turns 13 today. For birthdays, we typically let our kids pick a restaurant to celebrate. So, on Saturday, we hauled the family off to a buffet in Lima for a celebratory feast. Michael can be a challenge in a restaurant on the best of days. This, however, was not the best of days. Just five or ten minutes into our meal, Michael decided to vomit all over his plate. Three times. After that, he felt great, although covered with what used to be in his stomach.
We got the table cleaned up, and his clothes at least wiped clean, but the rest of our time at the buffet was spent with a pile of regurgitated slop on the floor under our table. I could smell it, and I have to assume that the other diners in our vicinity smelled it. The food was still tasty, but by this time, I was defeated. I just wanted to take my little boy out of the restaurant and leave, but I couldn’t because this was my little girl’s birthday treat.
Eventually, I was able to excuse myself and take Michael out to the van, where we just happened to have a bag of clothes that were destined for Goodwill. Catherine was happy, and the day wasn’t a total disaster.
God only knows what Michael has in store for us next weekend.
