Nursemaid's Elbow & Pictionary

I learned a new term this evening. You can probably guess by the title of this post. New term: Nursemaid's elbow. Other names this condition is known by: Pulled elbow, radial head subluxation, annular ligament displacement, babysitter's elbow.

So Katharine and I were in the backyard after church. I was reading my scriptures on the grass, she was wearing gardening gloves and playing in the dirt in her dress. 10-15 minutes into our outdoor time, she starts to cry and I can tell it's a real cry, a hurt cry. She comes to me, we take off her gloves, she says her arm hurts, she's not dirty so she didn't fall, but she's really crying. I take her into Corey and I'm wondering what happened... Did a wasp sting her? Was there a spider in her glove that bit her? Did she break her arm?!? Like she's really sad and it's definitely her arm that hurts. I can't see a bump from a sting, and it's not swollen like I assume it would be if it was a break or a sprain. The only other thing I can think of from things I saw in the dirt was a small shovel, about 3 feet tall, that maybe she picked up and it was too heavy so it twisted her arm to sprain it? We did not know what was wrong. She asked for a bandaid, and we put a big one on it. She bravely said "It's all better!" and she forced a relieved happy laugh, but then moved her arm and cried cause it actually still hurt. Corey held her and he let her watch Bluey to calm her down. She fell asleep still holding her arm, wincing a few times in her sleep. 

It was sad to see. She was hurting and we didn't know why. So... what do we do? I broke my arm as a kid and I made due for a few days until my parent's figured it out. If it's broken, we'll figure it out, so maybe we just wait until morning and see how she's doing? I woke her up from her nap when it was time for dinner, and she started to cry right away. Corey took her back upstairs and held her as we fed her some garlic chicken and rice. She didn't want any chocolate cake. I look up the Instacare hours - they are open until 9. Debating to take her in or not. Then at 4:59 I sheepishly text our wonderful pediatrician and friend, Jon who we've imposed upon many times (although he's come over here of his own free will too!): "Hi... question, we think Katharine either broke her arm or got a sting by a wasp cause she's crying about her arm but there's no swelling and we can't see anything visibly wrong. If you're around I was wondering if I can bring her by? We're thinking we'll wait it out and if she's still crying about it in the morning we'll taker her to the InstaCare." He texted back at 5:03 "I'm happy to see her, bring her by if you'd like" and with that I carried her to the car, I held her in the back as Mel drove us over, and in their great love for Katharine, Natalie and Daniel both wanted to come too. Jon answers the door, looks at her arm, does a little feeling and gentle movements. He asks if I've heard of nursemaid elbow as he moves it a bit more. K winces briefly but doesn't cry. I'd never heard of it. He sends Molly runs to get a starburst candy. She brings it back, Jon holds it out for K and asks her if she wants it. She reaches for it WITH HER HURT ARM and she's fine after that. It was like some strange magic, the pain was gone and she was all better! Thank you Dr. Jon!! He's a miracle worker. Thank you Molly!

He was amazed that I'm 13 kids in and no one's ever had a pulled elbow. K ate her starburst, still snuggling me. I was trying to put the pieces together in my head - I'm guessing it was the shovel? That maybe she picked it and that made the ligament slips out of place? At home she sat on the stairs, we told Corey what happened. Everyone was happy she was not hurt and crying anymore! "Katharine! Did the doctor fix your arm??" She sweetly said "yeah!" and wiped away the last of the tears on her cheek. And then we gave her chocolate cake. Mel said "I want to be a doctor!" and "Can you imagine just knowing all the possible things that could be wrong with any part of a human body??! Like I can't even remember half of the vocabulary words from my anatomy class..." Yes, it is very impressive, and I'm grateful for him blessing us with his expertise. 

So yay, that was a memorable event from today. Wayne was here as all of that was happening. He came over for dinner, and after she was all better and dinner was over, we played what turned into a pretty intense game of Pictionary (cause board games are always intense around here). Wayne, Mel and Natalie were a team - the Three little pigs (with a pig lego as their game piece). They snorted a few times as their team chant. Hyrum, Daniel, Lily and I were the penguins of madagasar "High one!" was our cheer, along with an occasional slap on the shorts "Hey now!" Abi, Sophi, Owen and Peter were "Ducky" from Toy Story 4. I had to draw blind date, and I was stumped. I was impressed with Natalie's drawing that got the win for them.

Just the bare essentials, quick and to the point! Good job. Whenever it was Peter's turn to draw, Corey had to whisper the word to him to see if he approved. 

He passed on a few that we thought should have been good, like "cow" and "dad". 

He drew fossil though! And did a really good job. Some of the words: magnet, dragon, old, submarine, spaceship, house, pig, nose, neighborhood, shark, frog, Bigfoot, snail, double chin. Goosebumps was a hard one... Daniel was the most upset of all the kids during the game. He took it personally when he couldn't guess a word, like when I drew "numb" - no one was able to guess it, but he was mad at the world. He went from weepy to ripping paper, kicking the table underneath and throwing his head down in despair. We didn't give his rage too much attention. He was also pretty sad if he rolled anything between 1-3. We all had our fair share of 1s, which was hard to take for all of us, cause it really is pretty sad to win a round and then only get to go forward one space. We had two dice, and if I rolled a 1 for example, I'd take it back cause "It was Daniel's turn to roll!" and then he'd roll and it would end up being a low number too. We were accused of cheating, Mel and Natalie tried not to cheat like us and they rolled 1s and 2s, we all got our share of low numbers. Not a lot of 6s. It was neck and neck up to the finish!! Words: Swiss cheese, heart, nun... Pigs landed on the last square!... ahh, stop them!

Ducky and Penguin catching up - soon we were all on the last square and trying to win the final word. We got Stripes but then there was debate as to who said it first, so we did a draw-off. The tie breaker word: Diaper rash. The three little pigs won it. I had no idea what Lily was drawing... it looked like totally inappropriate things.)

And now I'm here blogging, K is in the tub, Wayne and Corey and most of the kids are downstairs watching Apollo 13. SCHOOL STARTS TOMORROW for the little boys. Peter is starting kindergarten. it will just be half day for him this week, then full day starts next week. If it feels like too much for him, I'm going to ask about him going 1/2 day, but we'll see how it goes. If he really likes it, I'm ok for him to stay all day. I plan on catching up on the blog during September, unless K and I decide to just spend our days playing in the dirt or going on rides with her riding shotgun. The world is our oyster. I'm glad she only had nursemaid's elbow and end up needing a cast today!