The Absolutely True {And Also Very Long} Story Of A {Second} Broken Bone

Anyone remember that time last year when Baby Spencer broke his cute little arm? I sure do. Mostly because it was less than a year ago. And a little bit traumatizing. And resulted in a ridiculous doctor bill for the "procedure" of putting on Spencer's sling. 

Well.

Did I ever mention how, at Spencer's follow-up visit, the orthopedic doctor mentioned a study that involved the observation of children who had broken a bone early in life to see if they were any more careful in their future activities? 

Guess what? They weren't.

Case in point: Spencer broke another bone. This time it was his elbow. 

Tuesday: I was upstairs cleaning when the girls brought me a crying Spencer telling me that he had fallen and hurt himself. I'll be honest--I didn't think too much of it at the time, because, well, Spencer falls a lot. But when I saw how hard he was crying and how he was cradling his arm, all I could think was, "Oh, crap. I bet he broke his arm again."

The last time it happened, he fell on a Friday and we didn't take him to the doctor and find out about the break until Monday. I wanted to be sure we didn't make the same mistake this time, so I called Craig right away to tell him what happened. (Oh, did I forget to mention that my car was in the shop as of that morning and I didn't have a way to actually take Spencer to urgent care? Yep. We couldn't have timed it better if we had tried.) I called a friend to see if she could watch the girls, and Craig came home from work to take Spencer and I to the urgent care near our house.

At urgent care, they took an x-ray of Spencer's wrist. Which looked fine. 

Phew. What a relief to find out that there was nothing broken.

Friday: Spencer had still been fussy for the last few days, and had been needing pain meds pretty much around the clock, but we figured that he must have had a bad muscle strain that would take some time to heal. That night I was taking Spencer's shirt off to give him a bath and realized that his poor little elbow was all bruised and swollen. 

Crap. 

My first thought: They totally x-rayed the wrong bone, didn't they??

We debated about whether or not to take him to urgent care again. It was a Friday night. Urgent care would be closing in an hour. They didn't have any radiologists there to read the x-ray anyway. Oh, and did I forget to mention that we were leaving for a week-long vacation in California the next morning?  

Craig did some fast thinking and some quick internet searches and found a radiologist place that was open on Saturdays. Then he did some even faster driving to the urgent care (which, by this time, was closing in about 10 minutes) to pick up an order for an additional x-ray, this time, for his elbow. We figured, worst case scenario, we would find out the next day that something was broken and get his arm casted and just leave late on our trip. Worst worst case scenario, we'd have to wait until a place was open on Monday to get the cast on, and leave for California then.

Saturday: Early morning elbow x-rays. Then Craig calls me on their way back home to tell me that, while the office is open for x-rays on Saturdays, there aren't actually any radiologists there to read the x-rays until Monday. But not to worry. The x-ray tech is pretty certain that there is nothing broken, and that even if there were, they most likely would not put him in a cast anyway. He says it should be fine to just go on our trip.

Monday: I get a call from urgent care. I don't pick up because we are at Knott's Berry Farm. (I also don't worry because I am feeling pretty sure, at this point, that nothing is broken anyway.) 

 {before we knew it was broken...}

Tuesday: I call urgent care for the x-ray results and find out that Spencer does indeed have a fracture, in his elbow. They tell me to contact my pediatrician as soon as possible to get him a referral for an orthopedic doctor. 

Crap again. We are only two days into our trip and won't be heading back home until Saturday.

{...and, after. Thank goodness for Motrin}

I spent the next few hours on the phone with urgent care, our regular pediatrician's office, and the x-ray place. Urgent care can't send the x-ray results to the pediatrician unless the pediatrician requests them. The pediatrician can't request them without written consent from me. I can put in an order to the x-ray place to have copies of the x-rays sent to the pediatrician, but that takes 5 to 7 days to process. Etc., etc. I cry in frustration. I pound my fists. I wait on hold with every office for very, very long periods of time.

I finally find out that our insurance allows us to make an appointment with an orthopedic doctor without a referral from his doctor. I just need to get copies of Spencer's x-rays on the morning of his appointment and bring them with me. Spencer's appointment is set for the following Monday, just one day shy of two weeks since he fell. 

Monday: Pick up x-rays in the morning. Go to Spencer's appointment in the afternoon. Find out he needs a cast for 4 weeks to prevent further injury. 

Triple crappy crap.

Thankfully, the next few weeks were not too bad. We figured out how to do quick baths that kept the cast out of the water, cut our swim season short, and Spencer figured out how to do almost everything with his elbow bent with surprisingly little complaint. The morning after the cast was put on, he woke up and came over to me saying, "Mommy, help me!" wanting me to take it off. I wished I could. The first time he realized that couldn't go swimming because of the cast, he tried his best to pull it off. But other than that, and a few sad bath-times where he couldn't sit down to play in the water, Spencer took it like a champ.

{Ain't nothin' gonna break his stride. Ain't nothin' gonna slow him down...}

At yesterday's long-awaited cast removal appointment, the ortho doctor told us that Spencer has healed "like gang-busters." (I don't know about you, but I just love a doctor that'll say that.) 

Finally, this ordeal is over, and we are feeling very happy, relieved, and thankful. And hoping hoping hoping that we won't be dealing with this (yet again!) any time soon.

And that is the absolutely true, very long, story of Spencer's second broken bone.

{Now it's time to get this cute boy a haircut!}