The "No Broken Bones" Record Is Over

   Last Monday, I mentioned  bragged to a friend of mine that we had never had a broken bone at our house.  I was saying how remarkable it was that with three boys, as active as mine are, that it is some sort of incredible miracle that no one has ever broken a bone.  The boys play every sport offered.  In the afternoons, they play on the trampoline every day.  They hike in the woods.  Play tag, or even tackle, football.  They wrestle and rough house.  And until now, we have had the bragging rights of never breaking a bone.

  The "no broken bones" streak is now officially over.

  Yesterday afternoon, the boys and two of their friends, were playing football on the trampoline.  Anybody with any sense would realize that allowing five boys on the trampoline together with a football is not a smart idea.  It's a recipe for disaster.  But, I am not known for my "over protectiveness".  I pretty much just let them play and hope for the best.  This theory has worked pretty well in the past, but yesterday....not so much.

  Sawyer came in from outside.  He was crying.  I basically ignored it for a little while.  I was washing dishes.  A kid coming in crying from the trampoline is very common.  It typically amounts to nothing.  Most of the time the tears are out of anger because someone isn't playing fair.

  This time it was a bit different.  The tears didn't stop.  I asked what was wrong and Sawyer told me that he had hurt his finger.  I took a look at it and saw that it was already swelling.  I got him a cold rag to hold on it, but touching it made him wince with pain. 

  I hoped that the finger was just jammed and that the immediate pain would go away soon and he would be up off the couch playing with his friends.

  This did not happen.

  The rest of the crew of boys stayed outside playing and Sawyer didn't go join them.  That's how I knew for sure that he was really hurt.  He would never give up the chance to play football with other dudes unless the situation was dire.

The finger swelled more and started turning a lovely shade of purple.

I started putting ice on his finger and giving him some ibuprofen to help with the swelling.  The ibuprofen helped enough that Sawyer tried to go back outside and play. this decision didn't work out well.  He came right back in asking for ice to be put back on it.

I was still holding on to the possibility that it was just badly jammed and not broken.  I continued with ice treatments for the rest of the night hoping that it would look remarkably better by morning.

It did not look better by morning.

So.....we ended up here....

At Urgent Care.

The doctor tooks some x-rays and said he thought he saw a crack in one of the views, but he needed another view to be sure.  So we got yet another x-ray. 

This one was conclusive. There was a definite break.

The break is at the growth plate of his pinky finger and it would have to be put into a cast.  The doctor and nurse made a splint out of bandages and plaster.  The wrapping is intended to help stabalize the finger until we can go get his real cast tomorrow.

I am on the edge of my seat with anticipation of spending yet another day at the doctors office tomorrow.  I can hardly contain my excitement.