The Bravest Little Girl in the world

Both of my girls amazed me when they went to the dentist however, Brady proved to me last night that she is far braver then she showed me at the dentist.

 

(I am going to include lots of details, for my own documenting purposes, sorry if it gets lengthy)

 

Last night, July 30th, we had a function at Karl’s Commanding Officer’s house. We were getting ready to go around 8:45 so I brought Brady with me to the restroom. It was a small little half bath. I was closing the door, when Brady stuck her hand in the hinge. After the Conways (the CO) volunteered to watch Reese for us, we headed to the ER.

 

If you have a light stomach don’t read this paragraph: Her finger nail on her left ring finger completely came off. Also, about half way down the nail bed, she had a very deep laceration that went half way across her finger. X-rays confirmed there was no damage to her bone. However the cut went all the way to the bone, such that I actually could see it.

After assessing the injury and noting how agitated Brady was they decided that Brady needed to be fully sedated so that they could properly repair the damage. We had to wait until her dinner was digested, thus they schedule a surgery for 7 in the morning. It broke my heart that she would be dealing with an open wound for such a long time. They sterilized her finger, wrapped it up and gave her morphine so that we could peacefully wait out the night.

 

We were admitted to the hospital at midnight. The nurse was telling me how everything in the room worked, when she happened to mention there were free kids’ movies. As soon as she left the room, Brady politely asked to watch a movie. Here it was after midnight, knowing she needed sleep, I just couldn’t say no to her. So we sat up and watched Bolt until about 1:20. Then feel asleep with me in the bed beside her.

I didn’t much sleep for various reasons, so I had a long night of waiting for the surgery time to roll around. They came in twice to check Brady’s vitals, and I changed her into a gown (she still had on her street clothes) to prep for surgery and Brady slept through it all. She was TIRED! She didn’t even wake up, until I passed her to a nurse to go off into the OR. WHAT a TROOPER!!!

 

The procedure took about an hour. Then I got to join her in recovery. She was stubborn and didn’t want to wake up. It took them about ten attempts of saying her name and shaking her, then waiting 5 minutes to try again. She was in some pain when she woke up, and it took them over an hour to order the meds and get them to her. She got to have Tylenol 3 at this point. I also put a band-aid on her Bitty Baby so they could recover together. Brady loved telling her doll to be careful, not use the hurt hand, etc.

While waiting we watched another kids’ movie, Alien 3, ate lunch and soon discharged after that. We got to     go home around 12:45. Our follow up appt. is this Thursday    at 11:45.

 

I am also grateful for the wonderful friends I have in Pensacola. Once we got to the ER and realized we were in it for a long time. We called up our good friends, Jeff and Kristen, and they got Reese from Karl’s boss. They put her to bed at their house. She didn’t have her usual crib lovies or her pacis and they were able to get her to sleep through the night. Big thanks to the Moores!!! I even think she may have slept in a toddler bed for the first time in her life. Jeff also did all this on his birthday.

 

Random notes from the experience:

• At the beginning when Brady was really agitated, she keep saying she needed a “big band-aid”.
• Brady had to go through a lot and for not really understanding some things of the process like having to do lots of waiting, she was the most patient and brave little girl I could imagine.
• Even when extremely tired, I didn’t mind spending several hours just watching my daughter sleep. Even with all the pain she had, she seemed so peaceful when sleeping.

 

• Reese is also a trooper. She was left at a strangers’ (to her) house. Then picked up by someone other then her parents, and she went to sleep for the night without us. She can be a huge momma’s girl, so I felt like this was a huge feat for her.