Our Long Night Last Night

We had a long night last night. After repeatedly telling Rachel day after day after day to stop hugging the dog, he doesn’t like it, I know you love him but the best way to show him you love him is not to hug him when he doesn’t like it, Roscoe finally had enough of her ‘love’ and snapped and bit her in the lip last night around 6PM. I’m so thankful Drew was home and that he is super calm in a crisis, because I saw all that blood and went into panicked momma mode. Drew got her cleaned up, then calmly looked at me and said, “I think we need to take her to the doctor, you know, make sure we get it cleaned well enough.” Trying not to panic the 6-year-old. “Getting my keys,” I said.

If I ever am tempted to complain about the hospital at Ft. Knox again, I’m going to stop myself. The ER staff were wonderful - kind, compassionate, professional, and reassuring to the 6-year-old and her momma. They let us sit in a private waiting room so we weren’t out with the contagious people and, as the man who checked us in said, “So she doesn’t have people staring. She’s probably self-conscious enough already.” They got us back pretty quickly, and as scared as Rachel was, she amazed me by how brave she acted through the whole ordeal. The attending doctor looked at her lip and said that the dog took a little chunk out of her top lip and there wasn’t a way to stitch it, so she had another doctor come in for second opinion and they agreed to call the plastic surgeon at Kosair Children’s Hopsital in Louisville. As soon as she said, “It’s not really too bad, but she is going to scar, but let’s call the plastic surgeon and see if we can minimize it,” I started crying. I’d been holding it back, but I just looked at my beautiful little girl trying so hard to be brave and cried.

While waiting, I got a text from Rachel’s best little friend’s mom telling me that they just found out they are moving to Indiana, so they won’t get to be in class together this year after all. Her little friend’s heart is breaking, could they get together this week to say their good-byes? I didn’t have the heart to tell Rachel her friend is moving away with what she was going through right then. I’ll have to tell her this morning, though, and I’m dreading it. A lot.

After the call to the plastic surgeon, we were told that the best course of action was to transfer us to Kosair. One of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do was to put my little baby girl into that hospital van and tell her I was going to get my car and follow. Drew was home with the boys, so I had to drive behind rather than in the van with her. She was scared, but she nodded bravely. My heart broke during that whole long drive to Louisville until I met her in the hallway at Kosair.

While waiting, my phone battery died, so I wasn’t able to text or call Drew with updates. Had I known we were going to be driving to Louisville I would have charged it that afternoon. Lesson learned, always charge phone once it gets to half power, because you just don’t know what the day will hold.

After a long wait and several different doctors and nurses looking at her lip and sending pictures to the head plastic surgeon on call, the decision was made to send us home with some special cream and bandages and we will be calling this morning to make an appointment for her to see the plastic surgeon on Tuesday, per last night’s instructions. 

Because my parents read this, I want to reassure you and let you to know it doesn’t really look as bad as it sounds as I wrote this. The worst is right on her lip and she is doing fine this morning, but I think she’s finally learned why we’ve been so adamant about leaving the stupid dog alone.

You all probably know how much I hate driving. Well, with my phone dead, my GPS picked this, the worst night ever, at midnight in downtown Louisville on streets I’ve never driven in my life before, to decide not to work. I got turned around and spent an anxious 20 minutes trying to figure out how to get to the interstate, but finally found the signs that got me there. Then I drove home through the construction and really, really, really dark roads with no phone and a very tired kiddo in the back seat. That was scary. The good thing is, at that time of night, there isn’t much traffic out there and we got home at 1:30 AM. 

One thing that really broke my heart was when she wanted to know what she looked like with the bandage on her lip, so I took a picture with my phone before it died and showed her. She said, “Everyone is going to hate me. They’re going to laugh at me. Don’t put that on Facebook, Mommy! Get rid of it!” I assured her that we all love her no matter what, no one is going to laugh, we’re all just sorry it happened to her, and of course I wouldn’t post that to Facebook. How sad is it that she sees me on Facebook so often she would worry about that? So, no, I’m not sharing pictures here. Conviction from the mouth of my 6-year-old. Lots of things needing to change around here.

As I drove along behind the hospital van last night, I kept pleading with God to help her not to be afraid, and thanking Him for His mercy, because it could have been so much worse. He has my little girl in His hand, and I’m grateful.

God is good. All the time.