JT called me at work at about 12:00 p.m. yesterday…. our meeting at work had just finished. When he said, “the daycare called,” I think my heart stopped for a brief moment in time. Those calls are so scary for me because I know something happened to one of my children. William immediately came to mind.

Then my heart started beating again. Time resumed.

JT continued the statement, “Keisha fell down and hurt her lip really bad. Daycare said she might need stitches.” I attempted to filter out background noise in the conference room as some people were socializing and others left the room. He asked if I wanted him to pick me up to go to the hospital or stay at work while he handled it. By no means do I feel that JT cannot handle anything regarding the twins, but I of course wanted to go to the hospital to be with our daughter.

I completed my time sheet at work, then dashed outside. Thankfully, JT and I only work a few blocks from daycare. When we arrived at daycare, William and Keisha were sound asleep. I hated to wake them up but it was necessary. I looked at Keisha’s lip and surprisingly it was not as bad as I thought it was. The inner bottom lip was split right in the middle. Keisha then jumped into my arms and I consoled her. One of the teachers explained how the accident occurred. Keisha was playing basketball in the gym, threw the basketball up, jumped up in an attempt to catch the basketball ball, then I suppose as she landed she lost balance and fell. As she fell, she bit her inner lip.

Apparently we live in an age where parents beat their children, so I was forced to the interrogation like questionnaires from the nurses and doctors. Aside from the long waits, this is really the worst part of Emergency Rooms. All of the same damn questions. Of course some of the questions are absolutely necessary but multiply that times seven and you have two very irritated and tired parents. No, doctors and nurses, I did not slam my daughter into the basketball gym floor. K thanks.

The wait time is painful. It took about and hour to get seen by a nurse, then add an hour an a half to get seen by a doctor then thirty more minutes before we saw the senior doctor. The senior doctor was the most reasonable out of everyone. He actually put gloves on, took gauze with sterile water and cleaned Keisha’s entire lip area. How did the previous doctor come to his conclusion without doing that? I am not sure. Anyway the second doctor said that the lip heals very fast and he felt that the cut was not serious enough for stitches. In fact stitches would make the lip only bleed more.

The discharge instructions state: Watch out for signs of infection. Call or return if problems to your doctor. May give Tylenol for pain and swab the lip with hydrogen peroxide once or twice a day. Apply pressure if bleeding.

$100.00 co pay for emergency visits…. gone down the drain. eek.

But more importantly, Keisha is okay and that is what matters most.

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