How Not to Spend Your Tuesday

Waiting.

Waiting in the ER.

Waiting in the ER for hours.

I think we were there for a total of six hours.

Let's start at the very beginning, because that's a very good place to start.

The morning started out like any other. Asher waking up at the crack of dawn, wanting breakfast and play time. Akiko waking up and sliding down her slide to start her glorious day. And finally, Moses stumbling out of bed with his hair sticking out in every direction possible.

Joseph was getting ready to leave for work and we stopped what we were doing so we could have family prayer. After the prayer, the kids attacked Joseph before he could leave for work.

This is how most of our mornings start. It's wonderful.

Well, the kids didn't want to let Joseph go, so he stood up with them still dangling on him, where he would walk a few feet to the couch and drop them off there. Unfortunately, Moses let go a little too soon and fell to the [carpeted] floor where he hit his head pretty hard.

Moses was pretty inconsolable for quite a while. He calmed down after a long while, but would start crying again if you did so much as look at him. This went on for, I think, an hour.

Once Joseph got him to stay calm for a bit, he took him into the kitchen to see if he wanted any breakfast. That's where Moses threw up the first time.

More crying.

I called the doctor to consult with the nurse. We ended up playing phone tag. Moses threw up a second time. Then he fell right asleep.

Finally got a hold of the nurse. She asked me to bring him in to urgent care, rather than wait for an appointment with his regular doctor.

Loaded Moses into the car. Akiko, who was extremely worried about Moses at this point, came along. Asher had gone down for his morning nap, so Joseph was forced to skip his train to work.

Got into see the urgent care doctor in record time. While she was checking Moses out, who was slurring his speech so bad even I couldn't understand him, he threw up a third time. She called the ambulance because she felt he needed a CAT scan.

I called Joseph to let him know what was going on because I was going to have to ride in the ambulance with Moses. Luckily, our clinic is only about a 20 minute walk from our place, so it would be easy for Joseph to pick up the car.

The paramedics showed up, again, in record time, and checked Moses out and we loaded into the back of the ambulance.

On our way to the hospital, which was just around the corner, the paramedic received instructions to go to a different hospital further away in San Jose, because, apparently it's a better hospital and they wanted to monitor Moses there. I learned later that the hospital we were sent to and Stanford's hospital are the two best in the area. So, I called Joseph and let him know the change of plans.

Moses threw up a fourth time in the ambulance, though, I really think that one was more related to motion sickness than the concussion.

By the time we got to the hospital, Moses was looking and acting a whole lot better than he had been at home. The doctors told me that since he's doing so much better, they just wanted to keep him there for a couple hours to monitor him and it would be unlikely that he would need the CAT scan. They only do that as a last resort for kids Moses' age.

That's when the waiting began. It was also a little past lunchtime at that point.

Moses cheered up a little bit with the toys and stickers the trauma doctors gave him.

Joseph showed up with Asher after a bit, so I took Akiko and Asher to the cafeteria, where lunch was just about to close up, so the pickins were slim. They also only accepted cash, so I was only able to get a paltry meal to feed my whole family with the $7 cash I had on me.

So, the ER is a rather depressing place, I've decided. And it smells like rubbing alcohol, sweat and clotted blood. Ew!

Asher was going stir crazy because he wanted to get into everything, so we couldn't put him down (nor did we want to) and Akiko loudly complained about every five to ten minutes about how bored she was.

Moses wasn't allowed to eat anything, in the unlikely event that the doctors needed to do any procedures on him, so he was starving. He hadn't eaten anything since dinner the night before.

So, we waited. And waited. And waited some more.

Joseph took the other kids to bring the car closer to where we actually were and to get some snacks for the starving children. I stayed with Moses while he dozed off again.

Remind me to tell you the story of Moses holding my hand when I was in labor with Asher.

After a long, long while, a nurse came in to check on Moses. Since he seemed better, she said we could probably get out of there soon. She left the room and Moses threw up for the fifth time. Sigh!

I tracked down the nurse and told her about it. She told the doctor. He ordered a CAT scan. More waiting.

CAT scan results turned out to be fine, which meant that he had no bleeding or brain injury, and that Moses just had a severe concussion. They told us that we would get our discharge papers and we could go home. Then we waited some more.

Six hours after we arrived at the ER, we finally left to go home. I hope we never have to visit the ER again.

The good news is that Moses will be fine, though this is not his first concussion. That one was also consulted with the nurse on the phone, but not bad enough to need to be seen. My poor boy has a knack for whacking his head, so I hope it never gets worse than today.

And that is how not to spend your Tuesday.