Rock Girl

Last Friday (on her birthday), L came home saying that there was a rock in her ear. Naturally I dismissed this because how could their possibly be a rock in her ear? Well, the next day, she came to me with a bobby pin in one hand and a small black rock in the other and said, "See, I told you there was a rock in my ear!" I looked at this and realized that the rock had been put there so she could have the fun of getting it out. I told her not to do it again and then moved on. Apparently, I didn't spend enough time going over this concept (that being that we don't put rocks in our ears) with her because the next day, she came and told me that she had another rock in her ear, but that she couldn't get it out and that it was starting to hurt. I tried putting ear wax remover in her ear and having her lay with that ear down in hopes that would help ease it out, but to no avail. I tried just once to get it, but once I realized how far down it was, I quickly stopped and we made an appointment for her to see an ENT. When we got there, the doctor took one look and said it would require surgery. Yes, that's right. Surgery. She had pushed it so far down with her bobby pin in her attempt to get it out that she had wedged it down up against her eardrum and if he tried to remove it with her awake, it would tear her eardrum. Lovely. To her defense, she quickly told us that it was just a small rock.

So, this morning, she and I got up bright and early and headed down to the out patient surgical center. She got pretty nervous when it came time. Although I knew she was just fine, I had a hard time letting the nurse pull my tear-streaked little girl from me. It only took about 5 minutes before the doctor came in with the container holding the offending rock and telling me that thankfully, her eardrum was just fine, though she did have some scratching all through the ear canal.

When she woke up, she came out very woosey. They had given me a blanket to hold her with because as soon as they put her under, she had a little accident. (I asked her before she went in if she had to go to the bathroom... knew I should have pressed the issue). Well, she comes stumbling out and sits on my lap. There were a couple of nurses standing by asking if she wanted something to drink (she hadn't been allowed to eat since the night before). She was quite shy and embarrassed and would only whisper to me, but I had a really hard time understanding her because her words were still really slurred together. Finally I realized she was saying, "Mom, I think I wet my pants!" She was pretty mortified and didn't want to admit this fact to perfect strangers.

We are now home and she is doing just fine and enjoying the fact that she gets to miss school, even though she isn't sick. We kept the rock so, as Dave put it, "We can show it to her, her kids,..." and anyone else who needs a reminder as to why we do not put things in our ears!

Here she is just before they took her back with her mask. They let her pick what flavor she wanted to smell. She picked Root Beer.

At home again with the rock.

The rock. As soon as I showed it to her at the surgical center, she said, "See, Mom! I told you it was just a small one!"