When #1 was 9 months old, TheMan was pulling his shirt off and the button (or zipper or something) scratched his little eye. Of course he cried, and it watered, and he cried, but we figured like any regular, old poke-in-the-eye - it would quit hurting and life would go on, right? Wrong. Later that night, he was still crying, rubbing his eye, and it was all red and watery STILL! So, we convinced ourselves to go to the E.R.
After a couple hours of waiting in a germ-infested room w/ way too many non-emergency patients at our sides (come on people, go to the frickin' dr. for that cold!) we are finally seen. We actually didn't have insurance, so they made us pay up front. $275, if I remember correctly. (Thank Visa for being everywhere I want to be - and a few places I'd rather not be as well.)
The dr. puts some drops in his eye and then uses an ultraviolet light to look into it. I guess the drops are supposed to help the abrasion show up under the UV light and sure enough the dr. showed us where he had a nasty little cut on his cornea. Poor poor baby. They put some abx ointment in there and covered it w/ a nifty little eye patch. We kept meds in it and the eye patch in place for a couple of days and then all was well.
So - fast-forward to yesterday. #2's fingernail (still attached to the finger, by the way) ends up in #1's eye. When he was still VERY upset about it an hour or two later I started to think it might be more than just a poke-in-the-eye. Sure enough, 6-7 hours later it is STILL incredibly painful. The poor guy is crying and WAY upset because it won't stop watering and its hurting "soo soo bad!"
Husband looks up a few different drugs and goes to the farmácia (pharmacy for you gringos :p ) and gets some eye drops and some gauze to make a homemade patch. #1 was a little leary of the patch, so we explained to him that he needed to have medicine and keep the eye closed for the rest of the night. Of course he asked why, and in an ongoing effort to talk to him like the intelligent child that he is, we offered the straight-forward answer of, "If that little cut in your eye gets infected, it could make it so you can't see anymore OR if it got really bad, they might have to take out your eye." Resistance is now gone - and the eye patch is in place w/ little complaint.
He wore it all through the evening and night, and this morning when we're getting ready to go to school, for the first time EVER, he tells me that he doesn't want to go. :o He says that the other kids will think he looks dumb! HE says this several times and each time I assure him that I'll take the patch off before school and then we can put it back on when he gets home. When the time comes to get in the car and he's STILL resisting, TheMan digs for more info. When he assures #1 again that he'll take off the patch and offers to do it, #1 gets very upset and says, "I can't take it off or they'll cut my eye out!" :o
AHHHH, poor little man. Can you see the dilema (how the heck do you spell that?) he was facing? Leave it on and be made fun of - take it off and lose your eye forever! (Note to self: in the future tone down the adult-talk in medical situations.)
We managed to compromise and he let us take the patch off for school as long as we promised to put it back on afterward w/ medicine again.
Also, as a side note, he is SO concerned with what the other kids think of the way he looks. (Might have something to do w/ being fair-skinned and light-brown haired in a school full of dark latino children.) Sometimes when I dress him in woven pants and a button-down shirt, he'll make a comment like, "the other kids are going to think I look so 'sharp', aren't they mom?" Seriously! He says "sharp!" I know he gets that from Grandpa H. (TheMan's dad).
Hilarious! I love that kid!
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