the BROKEN JAW...LONG STORY!

The infamous words of a mother, "One of these days you/he, are/is really going to get hurt." Well, guess what- This mother's ability to gaze into the future, finally came to fruition.

Monday night- Jason and Dawson were rough-housing in the basement as usual after Jason's long day at work. We had some out of town guests staying with us (as usual, here at the Hotel de Rasmussen) and the 3 boys were bouncing and running on the inflated blow up mattresses. One missed judgement and a full forced fall on the floor, left our little Dawson SCREAMING at the top of his lungs! As it has been described to me, by one sad feeling daddy, was that Dawson went to jump on the mattress just as Jason moved it. The combination of the two, threw Dawson directly onto his chin, with no pause or chance to brace his fall. Almost 3 hours later of Dawson not being able to calm down, we headed to our pediatricians after hours care.
(Thanks Kyla for taking Carter!)

That night after 6 hours of worry, the x-ray report came back with 1 confirmed fracture in the upper left bone in his jaw and another possible break in the right cheek bone.

Tuesday morning- after being on the phone for hours, we were finally referred to Primary Children's ear, nose and throat specialists. We had an appointment to meet there at 4:00 pm. Well, I continued to ease Dawson's pain with Motrin, but for the record- had we not had an x-ray to prove the break...YOU WOULD NEVER KNOW! He was a little moodier than normal, and had some difficulty eating, but I would never have suspected a break. Maybe the usual tenderness because of what happened, but yeah...you get the idea.

SO- 4 pm rolls around and I'll save you the boring details, but by 9:30 pm we were able to leave the Emergency Room (yes, ER) We ended up having to have a CT scan taken of his face to properly determine the severity of the breaks and where they were. Poor Dawson wasn't able to eat anything in case they needed to put him under anesthesia for the Scan or possible surgery -nothing for almost 8 hours. The triage nurse decided it would be a "great idea" to have an EMT intern 'practice' putting an I.V. in a small child...so Dawson was then the target practice (not once, but twice) for an I.V. That was the worst part of the whole ordeal! I was even mad- not to mention my now bruised and bloody kid! And then after all of that- they didn't even use sedation. He was as still and as quiet as can be through the CT scan...His primary teachers would be so proud!

After all was said and done, they told us to keep him on a soft food diet for 3 weeks and bring him back for follow-up. Had it not been for my mother's carreer and practically growing up in a hospital and 'hospital talk' at dinner, I could have quite possibly had a nervous breakdown. Thankfully, I understand the process of how hospitals work (to some extent) so I wasn't super worried. I knew he was in good hands. Jason on the other hand, felt terrible about the whole thing...It's hard to not feel at fault, but I keep reminding him that accidents happen. But the next time I say "Jason, don't use your child has a human space rocket!" he might think twice.

As for Dawson, Motrin is his best friend. However, they did give me a prescription for Lortab...which I might use on either myself or Carter. (just kidding) And Dawson is going to get a lot of miliage out of all this...with his Birthday coming up and the guilt of his sweet daddy, I'm sure a few trips to Toys-r-us will be in his near future!