Friday is not a day that I want to relive...mmm... ever. This is how we started the day...

And this is where we ended up.  :(

So here goes...
First off, I hate Fridays. I almost always am just trying to get through the day. By the time Friday rolls around, I am usually just done. Done being a mom. Done with the dishes (not "done" as in, "I have finished them," but "done," as in, "I can not handle doing one more dish.") Same with the laundry, and the cleaning, and definitely "done" with being a single mom. It doesn't help that Josh doesn't usually get home from work till 7. I make it a goal to figure out something to do every week between 3 and 7 because that's the hardest time of the day for me, and I know I just need to get through sometimes.  Next week, however, I will have a different attitude.

So on Friday, I decided at the last minute that we needed to either go to the store or the park, but I wasn't quite sure which one. I ran upstairs to plug in my straightener, and put on my pants, and right after I plugged in the straightener I heard a loud thud, and then crying. I had left Grant in the high chair with Meili in the kitchen. I was sure that Meili had been playing with Grant and somehow knocked over the high chair. 

I wish I could say that I don't remember the scene I found in the kitchen, but sadly, I don't think I will ever forget. The first thing I saw was Grant still sitting contentedly in the high chair. But then I saw Meili. Her eye had blood streaming out of it and she was hysterical. I tried to wipe the blood off her face, and she screamed more. I tried to get an ice pack out of the freezer and she screamed more. I didn't know if I should call 911 or go to the hospital, or just try to wash it off myself. (I haven't been in a whole lot of emergency situations by myself.) I needed Josh. So I went to get my phone, but couldn't decide if I should take a picture and send it to him, or just call. Eventually I washed enough of the blood off of Meili's face to see that she had a whole in the side of the bridge of her nose. I decided that if Josh was going to be of any help, he needed to see her himself. So I ran upstairs, got pants on, threw the kids in the car and we were off. 

I called Josh, we stopped at his work, and he took one look at Meili and said to take her to Instacare-he also mentioned that he would be coming as well. In the car, I was trying my best to put the pieces together about what happened. After I saw that Grant's high chair wasn't tipped over, I figured that Meili had climbed on the counter to get a treat, and lost her balance. But my question was what it was that gouged the hole in her eye.

When we got to Instacare, I started to realize the struggle that I would have the rest of the night. I couldn't make Meili walk by herself because she was so miserable, and I needed to be with her, but I can't very well tell Grant to meet us inside. So, I balance Meili on my hip and do my best to squat while picking Grant's carseat on the way up. And I manage to lug the three of us into Instacare (with my purse, diaper bag, towel, and orange juice just to add to the chaos.) When we finally manage our way inside, the first thing I see is an 80-90 minute wait time listed on the screen. Great. This should be fun. 

I was trying my best to keep Meili from freaking out even more than she already was. She hadn't seen her face, and I made sure that Josh decided his verdict without her being able to hear what was going on. So I set her down in a chair, essentially facing the wall, so that other people's reactions wouldn't freak her out. That being said, she was drawing plenty of attention to herself with her crying, and the fact that she was covered in blood head to toe. Luckily the receptionist said that she would flag the doctors that we needed to get in quickly, and we ended up only waiting a few minutes. 

When we saw the doctor, he recommended that we move on to the ER. He said that they couldn't sedate her at Instacare-which was absolutely a must for me. And he also said that where it was her face, I probably wanted to do whatever would, cosmetically, end up looking best. Apparently I shouldn't have worried so much about how we were going to kill time today.

So I hauled the three of us and all of our mess back out to the car. By the time we got to the hospital, Meili had fallen asleep, and that made me nervous. 

On the way in to the ER, a man passed me and offered to carry the carseat. Thank goodness! He mentioned the super-strength of moms, and that's when I lost it for real. Because I wasn't feeling strong, and more than that I didn't want to have to be strong. I wanted to cry and have someone else deal with this. And I didn't want Meili to have to go through any of this. And more than anything I wanted Josh to be with me, and I was mad that he wasn't. I cried while I talked to reception, but eventually I got it back together. 

They got us to our room, and I talked with the nurse and doctor. They suggested that we have a plastic surgeon do the stitches. It's funny, because all along I was kind of hoping that it wouldn't require stitches-I don't know how that would be possible, so at that point, I finally realized that not only would it require stitches, but they suggested that a specialist take care of the stitches. So I guess it was a pretty big deal.

About that time, Josh got there. Thank goodness. There was absolutely no way that I could juggle the two kids, keep myself together, and make decisions by myself the rest of the night. At Instacare, I had already had to rock Grant with one foot while holding Meili, and when that wore off, I got him out of the carseat, only to find how hard it is to hold 2 kids-one of whom is in pain, and the other being very squirmy and curious about all the doctor's tools lining the walls.

One thing led to the next, and in the end, the plastic surgeon said that he believed it was a pressure laceration-meaning that she landed head-first on the left side of her face, and just the built up force, split the skin on the other side of her eye. (Which I think was a best case scenario in the situation because, since it was such a clean cut, the stitches brought it back together really well. Plus, I originally was so worried about the hole in her head that I thought they were going to have to do a skin graft or something.) 

They put an IV in her arm so they could sedate her, and she hated the IV, and I told her how much I hate IVs too. When she was sedated, they said they were going to numb the site, which ended up being my second least favorite part of the day. The nurse reassured me that she wouldn't remember any of it, but that didn't stop her from screaming and thrashing while myself, the nurse, two doctors, and the respiratory therapist held her down. She also had to have oxygen just to be safe while she was sedated. And the respiratory therapist just happened to be the guy who had carried Grant's carseat in, and made me cry the first time of the night. 

I held her while they stitched her up. Originally, I told Josh that I couldn't be in the room while she was sedated or while they actually did the stitches. But when it came down to it, I couldn't let her go either. So I just turned my head, held her in my arms, and rubbed her hand. Luckily, Meili was really funny while she was sedated, so that at least it lightened the mood in the room for a little while. She started out mumbling about horses. Then she said, "I feel like I'm flying." Then eventually she just kept saying, "This is fun. It's fun to fly in the sky." I was worried about me holding her at the point, because I was laughing and crying, and I was worried I was bouncing too much for the doctor to do his work. 

After the doctor was done, Meili slept for a little while longer before we had to wake her up. We had promised her a My Little Pony movie and treats while she was getting her IV, and we followed through. By the time we were home, she was back to her usual self. Josh's nephew was getting baptized on Saturday, and I told her that we would let her decide in the morning if she was feeling good enough to go. As soon as we got home, I put her in the bath, and I could hear her while I was feeding Grant, singing about going to the baptism and going swimming the next day.

By now, I've had enough time to calm down and realize that most kids get stitches or break a bone at some time, but on Friday I was pretty shaken up, and couldn't sleep because I was thinking about all the things that could have happened. Today, I felt extremely grateful that things have turned out the way they did. Under the circumstances, I think we were very lucky that something didn't happen to her eyeball itself, and that she didn't get a concussion, or a broken bone. And so far, she's been doing pretty well. We ended up going to the baptism, and swimming yesterday; today we went to my niece's blessing, and she hasn't taken any Tylenol during the day whatsoever. This is what it looked like today...

 Yesterday, and today, I was so nervous about other people's reactions to her, and I wanted her to still feel beautiful and confident. So she wore her Easter dress, and a bow in her hair, and we put glitter in her hair, and she wore her horse necklace-these things probably don't mean anything to other people, but for Meili they are all special things. I told her to look in the mirror and said, "Can you see the glitter in your hair?" And she said, "No, all I can see is my broken eye." :(  I honestly don't think that really bothers her though. Whenever Meili gets hurt, she doesn't like to dwell on it. It's just a fact of life, and she knows that it will get better everyday-I wish I could be so practical.

We're getting the stitches out on Friday.