The History
It all started Thursday afternoon at Sand Lake Elementary Library. Kira found a purple bead on the floor and decided to see how the bead fit in her nose. She found out that it fit perfectly. Once the bead was in her nose, the retrieval became a bit more difficult. After she fished around for it, she could not get the bead and had to tell the teacher what she had done. Mrs. Dworsky (her teacher) promptly took her to the nurse, who examined her nose, had Kira blow her nose and rinse it with a slippery soap solution. The nurse did not see anything in Kira's nose nor did Kira feel any pressure when the nurse tested pushing on the outside of Kira's nose. The school nurse told me to have Kira blow her nose frequently and watch for any signs of nasal drainage or mucus discoloration. After days of Kira blowing her nose, and me pushing on the outside with no results of her body being uncomfortable or seeming to reject the bead being lodged in there, I found myself persuaded to take Kira to the ER.
Elmendorf ER
They asked her many of the same questions that I had been asking for the past 2 days (e.g. do you feel uncomfortable when I push here?, Did it feel like you ever swollowed it?, Are you having problems breathing? etc. ) The triage nurse took a look and saw nothing, but had her blow the one nostril. Nothing came out. He took us back to a room to wait for the Doctor. While waiting for the doctor, Phoenix woke up from his nap.
The Incident
Kira needed to go potty so we found the bathroom and she went in. Kira assured me that she was a big girl and she could handle this by herself; Mommy should probably wait outside the door. While I was waiting, lights start flashing and an alarm sounds off. I thought "oh, this is prety cool, I don't think that I have ever seen an actual emergency at this emergency room." A man in uniform comes around the corner and asks if my daughter is in the bathroom. I answer yes, thinking that maybe they were ready to see us and they were just waiting for us to return to the room. Nope. Kira had pulled a red chain inside the bathroom the indicated an emergency inside the bathroom. The light that was flashing was above my head (right outside the bathroom door), and the siren was head all throughout the ER so that everyone would know that someone needed assistance. Of course, Kira still had not wiped nor pulled up her tights so she couldn't open the door for about a full minute while this annoying alarm is going off. The only silencing button is inside the bathroom. Kira is talking to me and answering my questions so the was no need to get the key to the bathroom and barge in on her, but when she finally opened the door, it was great to push that cancel button. Once Kira realized that she had made the alarm go off and lights flash, she was embarassed and wanted to leave before the docotr came in and found out it was her who had pulled the red chain (which she said she did out of wanting to know what the chain did).
The Outcome
As it turned out, there was no bead found in her nose. The first doctor came in and checked Kira's left nostril (the one that Kira said she had put the bead in) with every length of scope that they had. She asked Kira some questions and then checked the other nostril. After looking for ten minutes she declared that there was no bead up there. Then a second doctor came in and checked (slow day in the ER-- evident by the short time spent in the waiting room). Finally a peds tech came in to have a look. No one found the bead. One of several things could have happened: the bead fell out on the way to the nurse's office, the bead was washed out at school and they did not see it in the soap bubbles, the bead slid into her throat and was swollowed while she was sleeping and it will pass in a few days. All smiles by the end of the trip to the ER. Phoenix's nap was cut short and I am now paying for it, so the story ends here.
A couple of weeks ago we had the kids pictures done with RJ. Phoenix was completely uncooperative for staying within the scope of the background and we ended up with the last few pictures of me holding him in place, holding both kids, and holding him upside down to keep him on the background. Kira wanted to stay and watch Mason (one of the very few other kids RJ will photograph) get his pictures taken. After Mason's pictures were done, Kira wanted more pictures taken, but we were out of film so here are a few of the digital shots we took before leaving. As you can see, Kira was being cooperative and there are no digital shots of Phoenix.
