Ruby's broken...

Rather then rewrite the experience, I'll just post an email that I sent to family after we got home from the ER. Written on January 30th, the day she broke her arm. Pictures follow...

We just got home. Yikes. What a nightmare. It's so hard to have your sweet little ones in so much pain.

So here are the details. Know that Chris doesn't even know much of this because he is completely traumatized and can't see x-rays, talk to doctors or hear anything about the procedure she underwent (laying on me) in order to reset her bones. You should probably direct sympathy toward he and Ruby, and questions to me, because he's just totally beside himself over this.
I guess they were on the stairs that go to the loft. The beanbag was below, and they were jumping (Chris was supervising) onto the beanbag. Ruby thought she wasn't going to make it far enough to reach the beanbag, so she asked Chris to move it closer. Well, she overshot and missed it, catching her weight with her hand. She broke at a really common, weak spot just above the wrist on her right arm. Chris said he heard the break, and it was visibly broken. He knew it instantly.

He completely lost it and screamed bloody murder and then called to me "Ruby just broke her arm!" and I told him to take her to the hospital. He literally didn't know even that that was what needed to happen, he was in such a state of panic. Poor daddy. So he bounded down the stairs with Ruby in his arms, put her in the car and took off. I wanted to go, but didn't have shoes, and neither did Alice.
So Alice and I grabbed piggy, blankie, a throw and a cell phone and we headed off to the hospital. Alice was crying and really worried. I was worried, but I don't panic or really exhibit stress, it's just not how I handle things...so I just wanted to get to Ruby, make sure she wasn't in shock and calm everyone down.

When I got to the ER, her arm was in an ice pack with a little cardboard splint, and she was calmish. This was our first visit to the ER to be on the fast track, and it really gave me an appreciation for triage, as I didn't want her to sit there in pain for hours and hours. We were taken care of really quickly, and if I'm ever there again with a child that has a high fever, I will not mind waiting until they can get to me. Before I was even done giving our insurance info, they were off to a room where they put in an IV and gave her morphine. Hallelujah.
Our friend Jason was there this whole time and his help was really appreciated. Once it was appropriate, he and Chris gave Ruby a Priesthood blessing. Then we went to x-rays. After the x-ray, they knew more about the break and needed to reset her arm. I had to talk to the doctor outside of the room so that Ruby and Chris didn't have to stress out. The doc of course had to disclose risks involved with the particular med they were going to use to put her out during the surgery. It wasn't general anesthesia, it was some drug that makes her not remember or feel pain, but she was very, very responsive and dramatic while they were doing their horrible (but necessary) work. It's never fun for anyone to say that there is a possibility that your child could die from the medication. I mean, I'd rather have a kid with a disfigured arm than no kid at all, but really, I knew the odds were minor and tried to tell myself that the only reason that they tell you that they might die is along the same lines as why bleach can only claim to kill 99.99% of germs.
Anyway, Chris was on the bed with Ruby on top of him, but he couldn't be with her for the procedure, so I took his place. Jason stayed with us in case there was any reason why Chris might be needed in an emergency. There were two doctors, two nurses, a lady in charge of monitoring her blood pressure, another in charge of the anesthesia and another in charge of monitoring her respiration. It was kind of scary. They had prepared me that she might need to be intubated if she responded to the meds in a way that would stop her from breathing on her own for a short time...it was just yucky not knowing how she'd respond.

Two grown men literally broke a sweat using all their energy to put her little tiny arm back into place. They were pushing on my leg which was under her arm for some of it, and it hurt ME! It was horrible. She was unresponsive, so they started their thing. Then she totally started crying and screaming and moving all around, so we had to restrain her and they gave her more meds. Then she still was freaking out and so they gave her more. Then she was out. HALLELUJAH. It was soooooo hard to see her be in such pain, but as they had promised, she didn't remember any of it. Thank goodness. So this literally took like 7-10 minutes of them yanking on her broken arm. Chris would have died and truly wants to know nothing about it ever. Not even in six months. They wrapped her arm and put it in a temporary cast with a sling.

She woke up pretty quickly, maybe 10 minutes later. She woke up and was talking a little bit of nonsense for a minute. She said she had a dream about Full House and was telling the nurses that she really liked Full House. Then she found out that they had cut her darling shirt off of her arm, and she was wondering if we could shop for a new shirt. So cute. Next, my little Pollyanna came out and she told the nurse that she was glad she didn't break her leg. Or two arms, or a leg and an arm. She said that there were so many bones in her body that weren't broken, just one. So sweet. She was in remarkably good spirits after this procedure. I guess her arm felt better once it was set right. She asked if she could sleep with Chris that night and was wondering when she could go home. I was super proud of her!

So then we had more x-rays taken to see how the procedure had gone. If they didn't get he job done, then the Orthopedic doc was going to be paged to come to the hospital for further evaluation and possibly another procedure or surgery. Jason took Alice home so that his wife Rachel could bring her to our house and put her to bed.
At this point, we were comfortable and taken care of, so we moved down in priority and things went slower. Eventually, a doc came and asked me to come see the images. I was hoping for good enough news to go home...and that's what we got. The break was clean and they were able to get the bones really close to put back in place. I guess if you look at your arm from the side, having it aligned straight from that view is the most important, and it's literally put exactly into it's place. Looking from the top down, like the picture I attached, the broken bone is aligned so that maybe 25% of the bones don't match up. This was a very good outcome, and hopefully the orthopedic doc will feel the same way on Monday.

We were discharged and now we are home. Ruby is a sweet little trooper and we feel very blessed that the evening went as well as it did.
Ruby had lots of sweet visitors, the first being my parents...my mom stayed for three nights which got us through the worst of her pain, adjustment and sensitivity. We are all so grateful they live so close and so willingly serve us.
Ruby's friend Ella brought her candy, warm homemade cookies, bubble bath and the best kind of flowers...the kind that don't die. (BTW...notice the amazing wood floors that recently went from drab to fab.)Jensen and Ellie came with Mimi and Mia and brought her sweet things. Ellie gave Ruby one of her Christmas presents!! I think the lack of enthusiasm in this picture is due to Alice being the photographer. She's obsessed with my new little camera, and took a lot of pictures of Ruby's room after it was "heart attacked" by our friends, the Wilcox's. Ruby was thrilled with the surprise, and I have a feeling we'll have to burn our house to the ground and rebuild in order to lose the sweet hearts with well wishing messages.

This is her temporary cast, which was in place for 11 days. I'll post pictures of the new cast soon.

One thing that amazes me is that people responded so generously to the news of Ruby's injury. A broken bone seems so common, and I have to say that I don't think I would have had the same reaction had I not been through this experience. Friends who couldn't visit in person sent her things in the mail, my in-laws emailed a message to be written on her cast, visitors were here cheering my girl up and wanting to hear her story, cousins called from out of town...all of which was really appreciated. It really is a horrific experience, even though it is thankfully short lived, as she was essentially pain free after the third day. Amazing.

Anyway, I know now that broken bones are quite an ordeal!