2. I want to punch the idiot who invented rotating monkey bars.
I woke up that morning and literally had the thought, “things are finally starting to go smoothly.” NEVER, EVER, EVER think those thoughts EVER! Remember, anything that can go wrong, will go wrong… We set off to the baseball park to watch my nephew play. I loved the facility because there was a playground that my irreverent, baseball-hating children could play on. I sat on the bleachers closest to the playground and as soon as my behind met metal I overheard a conversation behind me, “You wouldn’t believe how many kids have broken their arms on those rotating monkey bars.” Immediately I screamed in my head, “WHY THE #%&@ DID YOU VERBALIZE THAT OUT LOUD.” I then reasoned with the devils in my head and calmed my self down.
My sister-in-law resumed childcare responsibilities while I left to work for a few hours. Twenty minutes after I left MY CHILD rode those bars into the sunset and crash-landed on her elbow. My sister-in-law nursed her and called me to tell me that she thought my little lady’s arm could be broken. I took my little girl to the ER for x-rays, exams, and the whole workup. After multiple doctors looked at the x-ray the determination that the bone was not broken was made. I took my little girl home and resumed normal life until nearly two weeks later I got a phone call from the hospital. The kindest receptionist informed me that after further review from yet another doctor that the bone “could” be broken. Because the original hospital I visited was three hours away, I visited our pediatrician who then referred us to an orthopedic specialist. After 12 hours of running like a chicken with my head cut off between different doctors’ offices we finally got the answer that the bone was indeed broken. It turns out that the break was located in a spot so rare that only a specialist really would be able to diagnosis it from an x-ray (go figure).
The silver lining: Because so much time had passed from the original break date and the bone was miraculously healing correctly, my little girl only had to wear a cast for 20 days which was just long enough to still think her bright pink full arm cast was cool.
