BROKE?! What do you mean BROKE?!

Monday, like a bit more than a week after Jeff left for Alabama I took the kids to the gym, per my necessary (especially when Dad is TDY) sanity break planning on the normal weight lifting day. Not 15 minutes into the day and the childcare lady came looking for me. She said that Kale had been hurt coming off the slide and just wasn't calming down and didn't want to stand. Oh man! So I went back and checked him out and after about 10 minutes still didn't want to put any weight on his feet, I knew something was up (this kid will knock his head and keep on walking - it's a 2nd child defense mechanism, I'm convinced). Thankfully, friends (who also live up the street) were there working out with me and were able to let Haley stay and play while I took Kale to the Hospital up the street.

10:00 we walked into the ER and by 2:45 we finally saw a doctor. When we left for the gym this morning we didn't plan on a trip to the hospital so I had no snacks or even a sippy cup so another good friend was able to bring Kale a lunch and some food for me too. Seriously? What would I do without these friends of mine? Oh yeah, I'd have a starving three year old and a starving, hurt 21 month old, as the hospital for nearly three and a half hours! Awesome!

Anyway, they x-rayed him three times on his left ankle (where he felt most of the discomfort), and determined that there was no visible break but explained that with toddlers it can sometimes take five to seven days for a break to show up and that we should follow-up with the pediatric orthopedic soon and see what she has to say about it. They put him in a "soft cast" which was basically a fiberglass splint, wrapped with an ace bandage. He couldn't get it wet and was not allowed to put any weight on it. I was worried about the latter part of that advice, but it didn't seem to be a problem since he just didn't want to put any weight on it.

His new favorite hang out: by the tv with his babylegs on and his soft cast. Oh, and his Duplo blocks. He LOVES his Duplo blocks and has logged many hours with those things since getting his soft cast.

Favorite show? Yeah, lately it's been Strawberry Shortcake - I get it, it's Haley's favorite too, and it's all ranch/farm themed so I think it's less about the characters and more about the topics. But he runs around demanding "Shortcake... Shortcake!"

Yesterday (Thursday) we did the follow-up with the Pediatric Orthopedic (Dr. Mindy Siegel). She did some poking and prodding and determined that there was a "toddler fracture" on his left tibia. The doctor told me that she was almost certain that this was caused by his shoe catching on the slide as he was going down stopping his foot while his body continued forward. She also wanted to make him crawl to rule out a broken femur. Now, I've seen him crawl in the past couple of days but the doctor had to see it too. She asked if she could bribe him with s-u-g-a-r, and if you know me, it's nothing my kids haven't seen or been bribed with on a near daily occasion so, yeah, go ahead. We pulled out an entire bucket of suckers and nothing. Pulled his ga-gi away from him, nothing. Unwrapped the sucker, nothing. I finally went around the corner of the hallway and played peek-a-boo with the unwrapped sucker, and the ga-gi and he came smiling around the corner to see me and gave the doc what she needed to see.

She determined that he needed to be in a short cast for three weeks (for those of you doing the math, it comes off the day before Dad comes home). She also said that they now offer a Gortex waterproof cast but that insurance won't cover it so I can pay... wait for it... $10 out of my pocket. What? $10 so that when my kid inevitably sticks his foot in the dog water (happens once a week) I don't have to run back to the doctors and get a new cast put on? Yeah, sold. I would have paid a lot more.

Also, it's very much worth noting that my kid was an absolute champ getting his cast on. He sat there with no tears, fussing, not even so much as a flinch putting the cast on. To include when they had to use the saw to cut some off to free his baby piggy. He was a perfect angel. I just can't help but worry about when Karma is going to catch up with me for this one... he can't have been that good for no reason at all. Or, maybe it is my Karma for having to deal with a kid in a cast for three weeks. Yeah, it's going to take more than that. So, here are the pictures of The Dude and his cast.

This one says "See? This is my good foot!"

Haley and Mommy were the first ones to sign it. Haley chose to draw a picture of Mommy, Daddy, Haley, Kale, Gramma, Papa and Uncle Ben. Clearly.

I feel it should also be noted at the end of this post, that I'm creating a new label for this post and quite likely future posts: Injuries. Like they've told me at the ER... I have a boy, this probably won't be my last time in the ER. For the record, it's number 3 for him, the first for injury.