Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Leave It To The Princess


As you all know I have three boys.  With three boys comes the usual wrestling, fighting, chaos, mess, dirt, poop and fart jokes, and all sorts of other craziness.  You know, typical boys stuff.  But they are still good boys and we have managed to escape a lot of unfortunate side affects of boys that I've heard other people talk about.   Stuff like;

pooping in the bathtub,

climbing out of the crib, or

sticking Legos up a nose.

My boys have never done any of that.  All of that was left to this one:
(Thank you Auntie Sarah for the wonderful princess apparel.  You really are like her fairy godmother!)

She may look like a princess but she certainly knows how to keep us on our toes.  I told the story of the bathtub incident.  Easy enough mistake to make when you are little.  And she is the only one of my littles to even entertain the idea of climbing out of the crib, much less actually do it.  And this evening she did what I hoped would NEVER happen in my house.   She stuck a Lego up her nose.

Now, normally she isn't even allowed in the library when the boys are playing with Legos.  They are supposed to close the door and not let her or the dog in when the Legos are out.  Somehow, Grace got in there, and even though it was only for a a very brief moment she managed to find a teeny, tiny, bright orange, round Lego light and stick it up her nose.  The minute I found her in the room (which was probably about 30 seconds after she entered the room) I ushered her out.  Her nose sounded stuffy so I asked her to blow it.  When she blew it she said, "OUCH!!!  OWWIEEE!!!"  That seemed rather odd to me.  When I asked her to blow again she started bawling.  I got a terrible feeling.  I took a flashlight and checked and sure enough there was a Lego lodged waaaaayyyyy  up there.

A quick call to Todd and he was on his way home.  Another quick call to the peds office and Grace and I were on our way.  Unfortunately, the on-call peds doctor was unable to suction it, or blow it (don't ask) out.  Then they called an ENT specialist to come in but there was some fight about who was actually on call and NO ONE came.  I was then told to drive an hour to Milwaukee's Children's Hospital and they could remove it there.  ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME??

I decided to head over to the ER at our normal hospital even though I know that the ENT schedule is the same there and no one would show up.  I was hoping the ER doc would be able to something for us.  Nope.  No such luck there either.  Apparently, none of the doctors I saw wanted to attempt to remove the Lego and then have it slide even further up her nose, or even worse, have her take a deep breath during the removal process and have it get into her lungs.  Both the ER doc and ER nurse said that if it was them they would probably just leave it there and go to the ENT doctor in the morning.  Good grief. 

I was so miffed. We have two large hospitals in my city and NO ENTs that can help us after 5?  It is a crazy world. 

So, after three hours of torturing Grace (and probably two big doctor's bills for nothing) and no help dislodging the Lego, I packed Grace back in the car and we went home.  I was so frustrated and upset and concerned.  I just couldn't give up on it.  Todd thought that maybe he could get it out but it was pretty far up her nose at this point and I could barely see it.  I just kept having visions of the Lego getting stuffed farther up there and her breathing it in and it going in her lungs (thank you, doctors, for that worry). 

I decided to try suctioning the Lego out a bit again (with one of those baby snot suckers) and I got it down further than it was before.  Finally I thought I could possibly try and take it out with a tweezers.  The first couple of times I don't think I went in far enough.  It was so scary trying because I couldn't see anything.  I just had to guess approximately where it would be.  The next thing I know I felt the Lego in between the tweezers and I pulled the little bugger out. 

What a relief!!!!  I felt like I had just performed successful brain surgery or something.  We all jumped around, screaming and shouting and dancing, and Grace got a few cookies to help with the ordeal.  So glad my little lady would have a safe and peaceful nights sleep.  What an ordeal.   
Yes, she may look like a princess, but don't let her fool ya.  She has a few tricks up her nose her sleeve.

24 comments:

Cyndy Bush said...

My baby did all the crazy kid stuff, too. My older ones never did any of that stuff! She cut her hair, and stuck a bead up her nose, and all kinds of crazy stuff!

Kat said...

Oh mercy. That is a good reminder to have the boys keep all of their school scissors WAY out of reach. I could totally see her cutting her hair. Crazy kids.

Jody said...

love your blog, have been reading it for a long time...first comment :)

i'm a mom of three boys as well and we just experienced this last week, with a pea! i finally ended up using my nasal sinus rinse bottle (sorta like the neti pot but with more pressure) and shot that little bugger right out of there, haha!! but it was quite the ordeal!
(ps. you give me hope i may yet have a baby girl ;)

Anonymous said...

Oh! That poor kid! How totally scary for you.

Kat said...

Unknown- Thank you for commenting! It is nice to hear from ya!
The docs were telling me of all the crazy things kids have put up their noses and peas were very high up on that list. ;)
Very creative way for you to get that out! I guess moms just know better sometimes. :)

Tonya said...

oh my word how scary! I'm so glad you got it OUT. Just another reason I don't care for doctors...

lime said...

ok the pictures alone of who to expect to do insanity are hilarious. the lego up the nose ordeal, not so much. i think you shoudld submit a bill to the respective hospitals for being the one to succeed when all these MDs failed ad wasted your time and caused you worry.

my son stuffed a bead up his nose on 9/11/01. when i said we'd have to go to the doctor he was terrified they'd have to cut off his nose to get the bead out. i assured him he'd get to keep his nose. as it turned out we got there and waited andaiand then he SNEEZED the bead out and we hightailed it outta there before they could charge us. but part of me envied him that the biggest tragedy in his world that day was a bead in the nose. such innocence.

Kat said...

Lime- I was seriously trying to think of ways to get Grace to sneeze last night, but nothing worked. Plus, she has such a TINY nose that the docs said a sneeze probably wouldn't help.
And yes. Innocence of childhood is precious. I thought of that yesterday as we waited in the hospital too. Oh that all families' biggest worry was a Lego in the nose. Perspective is good. :)

Jessa said...

I am so glad my kids have never stuck anything up their noses! I would have freaked. And have the doctors there never seen a child with something in their nose? Geesh.

Kelly said...

LOL, loved that last line. Once again mom saves the day. I can't believe you couldn't find a dr. to help you. Sheesh! At least you had a happy ending. Maybe it's a girl thing. I remember getting a little grommet from a book up my nose and my mom had to take me to the dr to have it removed. lol

Unknown said...

Did you see my post about this same thing last week? Yep. G said he put a rock in his nose but I never saw it.... crazy kids. Why do they do things like this to us Mommies? ;)

MamaB said...

Yeah both of my girls were tub poopers...so glad that phase is over! Amelia use to shove shredded tissues up her nose...I can't tell you how many times we had her between our legs picking out snot covered kleenex and then a week later she would sneeze a gaint wad of slimy goo covered tissue and she would go "aww...better!" Hope this is the last of "there never" episodes!!

Lora said...

How crazy!! I can't believe she did that! And I really can't believe there was NO ENT available that is just ridiculous. Glad you were successful with the tweezers.

Robyn said...

Glad you were able to get it out. For some reason my girl did/does all of the typical boy things too. But she has also cut her own hair, a couple times.

Robyn said...

Glad you were able to get it out. For some reason my girl did/does all of the typical boy things too. But she has also cut her own hair, a couple times.

historygirl said...

We've had the pooping in the tub (with both girls...awesome) and hair cutting, but nothing stuffed up a nose. I'm glad you were able to get it out!

Love her princess outfit! We have princess outfits coming out of our ears...she'd feel right at home! :)

Hilary said...

I have a hard time accepting that you couldn't get a doctor to help with this procedure. It's quite common among wee ones.. you'd think someone could do it. Oh wait.. .someone did. Good for you, Mom. I hope you won'tbe charged for the non-care.

Riahli said...

So scary! And here I was finally giving in and letting my son get some of those little legos for his sixth birthday, hummmmm... might have to rethink that! Crazy that after all that, you got it out! My youngest son once stuck a piece of crayon so far up his nose we had to take him to the ER, and they eventually had to have him go to sleep with medicine in order to get it out, that bill was not pretty.

Scrappy said...

Whew! That is crazy! I am so glad you were able to get it out!!
Buttercup is SO much more likely to do something like that than her 3 older brothers. What is with these girls?!!

painted maypole said...

oh my. ouch.

well done, getting it out.

Mom24 said...

Oh my goodness! How awful!!! But, kind of funny too. Hang on for the ride that is Grace. :)

Lindsay said...

Oh dear...sounds like my Addie - TROUBLE!! And seriously - she sat still for you to put a tweezers up her nose?! Impressive.

Kat said...

Lindsay- After all the trauma in the docs' office (it took three of us to hold her down while the doc tried to suck it out) everytime someone even wanted to look at it she freaked out. After we got home I just let her calm down a bit and eat some dinner (it was almost bedtime at this point). Then I calmly talked to her and told her what I wanted to try. I let her look at the tweezers and feel it and know that mommy wouldn't hurt her. I gave her a flashlight to hold and she actually sat still. I COULD NOT believe it. I was AMAZED. I kept talking about it later how shocked I was that she was so good for me after how much she struggled with the docs and my sweet little Tommy said, "That's because she loves you and not the doctors, mom!" Awwww. Maybe true. ;)

Kat said...

Just wanted to update everyone who may be reading this post that the pediatrician sent me a "no bill" statement. I thought that was awesome because he actually spent time trying to get it out.
The ER, however, sent me a bill for almost a thousand dollars and the docs there didn't even do ANYTHING. We weren't sent back to a room, they didn't try to get it out, they didn't listen to Grace's breathing. Nothing. All they did was look up her nose with a light. We were only there for five minutes. I ended up filing a complaint and the bill was eventually wiped out. Whew!

Words To Live By

Be grateful for each new day.
A new day that you have never lived before.
Twenty-four new, fresh, unexplored hours to use usefully and profitably.
We can squander, neglect, or use them.
Life will be richer or poorer by the way we use today.
Finish every day and be done with it.
You have done what you could;
some blunders and absurdities crept in;
forget them as soon as you can.
Tomorrow is a new day.
You shall begin it well and serenely and with too high a spirit to be
encumbered with your old nonsense.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson