injury & A&E!

We are back now from another camping holiday. The weather was brilliant this time (let’s face it; it couldn’t have been any worse!) However, it was the trips to A&E that were the ‘highlight’ of this trip instead of the rain! Georgia managed to climb up the slide the wrong way and just as she got near the top, a little girl came down and knocked her off. She was ever so good in at the hospital, she had an x-ray and she had broken her arm. They put a little half plaster on to wait until the swelling had gone down, so it was hard on the top and soft bandage underneath and only went up to just below her elbow. The consultant came out with a great comment, the conversation when something like this,

Him “How old is she?”
Me “ She’s two and a half.”
Him “Any brothers or sisters?”
Me “She has a twin sister and two older sisters.”
Him “A twin? Really? And how old is her twin?”
Me “Eeerr....she’s two and a half as well!!”
I think he realised as soon as he’d said it!

Anyway, so we spend the rest of the holiday desperately trying to keep this plaster cast clean and dry. This is not an easy task on Whitby beach, when she is jumping in the waves in her usual two year old unsteady way! Well, we manage to keep the cast intact for the rest of the holiday, with no more injuries, even though she seems to trip over everything in the tent (maybe we just notice it more because we are trying to get her to be careful?) Then we come to packing up day, towards the end of getting everything sorted, Georgia asked if she could go and sit in the car. She was tired and might go to sleep, so we strapped her into her seat and carry on with the packing up. When we have finished and start of load the others in the car, we notice that Georgia has pulled her cast off her arm (obviously the swelling has gone down, and she’s had too much time to fiddle with it!!) When I said, “Oh no Georgia, you were meant to keep that on!” she just smiled and said, “All better now!” So off we set again to A&E, this time with everyone in the car and all the camping stuff loaded. Fortunately, they fitted the proper one this time, hard all the way round, that goes above her elbow – I don’t think she’ll be able to pull this one off, but I wouldn’t like to set her the challenge!

The day after the first trip to A&E, we were given an out-patients appointment in the fracture clinic to have the cast checked. As we were on our way out for the day and both Rob and I wanted to see the x-ray (they didn’t show me the night before) we all went to this appointment. I felt that we made such an entrance when we walked into the waiting room, six of us, all a bit hot and sweaty from camping, four very grubby little kids in tow (the play park at the campsite was particularly dirty and sandy!) one child with her arm in a grubby plaster cast. Then there was all the fuss and arguments about who was sitting with whom, who was sitting in which chair and who was sitting on whose lap in the waiting room! Everyone knew we’d arrived! On the plus side, we were seen relatively quickly...maybe someone had realised the potential struggles with the situation if we were made to wait any length of time?!! (either that, or they just wanted us out of there!)

So today Hannah has fallen over and banged just near her eye, she ran into the hall, slipped and went head first into a wooden box; she’s got a cracking bruise and a little cut. I think it’s looking okay, I’m really hoping it won’t need a trip to casualty, I can just imagine us all trouping in, one child with a black eye, one with her arm in a cast....!