His Broken Bone, My Broken Spirit

My husband has always believed that broken bones are a reflection of one’s own parenting. I’ve always disagreed with this theory thinking it’s not so ‘black and white.’ Accidents happen all the time and sometimes when you’re not even with your child. Perhaps on some subconscious level kids might get hurt as a cry for attention, but I’m certain this is not always the case.

I find it hard to believe that in almost 5 years as mom to a rambunctious boy—with two previous ER visits—one of them hasn’t resulted in a broken bone. Today’s call from preschool surprised me. Fell at school? Running around with his friends? C’mon! The kid climbs trees and swings from monkey bars way too high. He’s a crazy daredevil and yet he’s hurt from running and falling with friends? What a pain!

So, as luck would have it, my babysitter was with Anna this morning when I got the call. I was able to call the doctor on the way to school and make an appointment for 10 minutes later. The doctor was pretty sure his finger was badly hurt. They made us an appointment with an orthopedic guy down the street to fix him up.

Never a tear was shed during this process. They took x-rays, and he thought it was the coolest thing ever. Mainly because he got to wear a smock like at school. When they put the x-rays up on the screen, Alex was stoked about seeing his skeleton. But when the doctor mentioned the cast and my face dropped, Alex quickly picked up on this not being a good thing. I tried to make is sound fun and cool (because really all the cool kids in school always had the casts), but he wasn’t buying it. The casting man let him pick out the color for the cast: blue—big surprise there. Then he went to work wrapping up his arm. Alex was way past done on all of this by now. Six hours after the incident, and he was ready to go home.

The surprising thing through all of this was his self control. I asked him if hurt. “Yes, it hurts, but only if I move it. So I’m not moving it!” And sure enough he hadn’t moved it at all except when someone asked him to try and move it.

So I’ve been trying to spin the whole incident into something fun. He got to pick where to go afterwards—Dairy Queen for the biggest ice cream ever. I suggested he was like a pirate since he had one good hand one hand kind of like a hook. He seemed to perk up with that thought. But the ultimate was the idea of having a “cast party” after the cast comes off in three weeks. He’s already planned the whole thing.

My real disappointment was for school. No follow up phone call from someone to check on him, and never an apology about the situation. Disappointing, I think.

As I went to bed last night and peeked in on him, with his arm lying across his chest, I felt terrible for the little guy. What a pain.