Add that to the list

Remember how we had to give Jane steroids every day for eight months? And antibiotics to Megan for seven months? And how Jane broke her leg? And how Megan had major surgery?

Well, yesterday
Megan broke her arm.
Let's add that to the list.

It happened at Chris's grandparents' house in Sugarhouse. We were there for the monthly Pyper family dinner. Chris and I were in the kitchen visiting, and the girls were running around with their second cousins. There were lots of people around, so I wasn't really worried about watching them too closely.

Then we hear screaming. It's far away, so it takes a minute to realize that it's my kid. Grandpa Pyper headed down the stairs and picked up Megan. Yep, you guessed it. She fell down the entire flight of stairs into the basement. Only Jane (3) and Kambri (2) were with her at the time, so we don't know exactly how it all played out, but we know for sure that she went all the way down.

She was brought to me and sat on my lap for a Long Time. At first she was extremely upset, but I couldn't tell if it was a painful cry or just a super scared cry, as I'm sure she was completely freaked out from falling so far. She calmed down after not too long once she had a drink and her pacifier, but she wouldn't dream of getting off my lap. That was fine, I just kept visiting with Chris's aunt Carolee. We both started noticing, though, that she wouldn't move her right arm. It just hung at her side, and anytime there was something close by to pick up, she would either use her other arm, or just look at it and whimper. Not normal! I felt her arm and moved it around a little bit--she didn't like it, but she didn't really object, either, so who knows what it meant, right?

Here's where we got lucky. Chris's uncle Sean is a doctor and he was there. Yay! We gave Megan some toys and watched her not use her arm, then Sean checked her out. He was telling me that "When kids fall, they usually have a break right about here" and she SCREAMED. Yep, we found the spot. And after dropping Jane off at my parents' house, off to Instacare we went.


This was one of those parenting moments when you can't help but second-guess yourself the entire time. There was no visible injury--no bruise, no bleeding, no swelling--and after her tylenol had kicked in, Megan had even started moving her arm around. She still wouldn't grab anything, but she was moving it up and down no problem. Sigh. All I could do then was wonder if we should have waited a day and it would have just fixed itself, like kids do so often. But we were already there. And good thing, too, because it was in fact broken.

Here are the x-rays:


On this first one, you can see just the tiniest bump on the side of the bone, which I've circled. This particular x-ray is mostly fun just because you can see Chris's fingers, too.


The scan didn't pick up the actual break well, so I traced it in red. It is called a buckle fracture. It's only a tiny little break, but it goes towards the inside of her bone, rather than down the side like a hairline fracture would.


This x-ray shows the biggest difference. You can see a bigger bump, again inside the circle.

Overall, it's not really a bad break. It should only take 2 or 3 weeks to completely heal, without any worries of disrupting growth plates or anything. They put on a splint at the Instacare and sent us home.


That nurse, by the way, was one of the nicest nurses I've had working with my kids during all our random medical experiences. She was great with Megan, and it was her idea that we would want to have copies of the x-rays for "future bragging rights." It was fun, too, that everyone thought Megan was just the cutest thing ever. :)

Here is a picture of her this morning in the splint.


They said this is all she really needs to have for the break to heal, but I'm hoping we'll be able to get her into a hard cast anyway. She has moments when she desperately tries to get the thing off and I'm worried that with just the ace bandage covering it, she'll succeed. Our pediatrician has referred us to the Fracture Clinic at Primary Children's. We'll see what they have to say as soon as they call me back.

And here is a picture of Jane just because Megan was getting her picture taken and Jane wanted one, too.


So, in our three years and two months of being parents, we have now done daily steroids, daily antibiotics, broken leg, major surgery AND a broken arm. If we're this bad with our girls, what's going to happen when we have a boy?