What's a Saturday without a trip to the ER

The day started slow. I had a delivery to a customer to make and on the way back I picked up some buns from a store down the road and we sat around eating sweets and playing video games.
Around three in the afternoon the girls went outside to play in the side yard while I took down the Christmas tree and Teri finished up the house cleaning. I looked out the attic window and saw Elena swinging a stick, being the bad parent I am I watched her swing the stick and didn’t say anything. She was swinging it very fast and carelessly. I did talk to the girls from the window, but I never said anything about the stick.
About an hour later I’m taking the tree apart when I hear some commotion coming from the back door and the kitchen.
I hear Teri saying “What’s going on?” Then I hear her say “What happened?” Then she franticly calls me to come there. When I come from the front living room to the Dining room I see a little blond girl, Nastia crying and blood seems to be pouring from her face. I panic, but there is no one else to turn to, My Wife has called me in a panic, my daughter is injured and I’m not sure how badly and I don’t know what to do. This is a first for the both of us and it was really not something I gave much thought to. Why I don’t know. If I was to have thought about it I’m sure I still would have panicked at that moment.
The first and only thing to come to my mind was to put cold water on it, so I say “Let’s put some cold water on it.” We go over to the sink and I grab a dish towel, of course it was a well stained one and when it accompanies us to the ER I’m thinking I should have taken a clean towel, yea your right it was my wife Teri saying that.
I gently apply pressure to the wound and Teri says maybe I should put something cold on it and I go searching through the freezer for the mini cold packs she had gotten from the doctor and manage to find one hidden behind some container of frozen forgotten and gently apply it to her face. Yes I did forget to say the wound was under her eye high on her right cheek. It’s amazing how many times it’s on the cheek under the eye and yet it manages to miss the eye itself. Thank God.
I’m applying light pressure to her face when she coughs and a bunch of blood flows out of her nose. I start to wonder if maybe we are in deeper trouble then I thought. That is my major problem in all this. I’m handling it like a small cut and what if it is not a minor thing and all the blood that just flowed out of her nose is an indication that she is bleeding inside and I am wasting very important time.
Since the cut and Teri calling me maybe two or three minutes have gone by. Teri has gone upstairs to get dressed and we are going to the ER. It’s not like I’m reading war and peace and debating what to do. The blood stops flowing and Teri comes down stairs. This is where it becomes the keystone cops. We decide to take her car after a quick debate. My car is out front and it’s in the road. She wants me to care for Nastia while she drives to the ER in Nyack. I go out the front door and leave the door open figuring she is following. She goes out the back figuring I’m following. When she see I am not she comes back and shuts the door and goes out the back and we meet at the car. She drives at a reasonable pace considering the state she is in and we manage to get to the hospital without killing ourselves or anyone else. I take Nastia into the ER and Teri and Elena park the car.
I am now calm and feel everything is going to be all right. We are in the hospital and I am at the front desk and the blood has stopped flowing and if this was me I would consider not going to the hospital and just go home, put a few butterfly bandages on it and be done with it. But it is our brand new oldest daughter and this is our second trip to the ER, our first with blood, and I want to do it right plus Teri would not approve.
Our wait is short, we get a space and the attending doctor or maybe someone lower down then that looks at Nastia and say she should have a plastic surgeon look at her because the wound is jagged.
She is given two tetanus shots and she cries up a quick storm. She is not one for pain it turns out. Her Sister on the other hand will grit her teeth and take it. They are night and day in that respect.
The plastic surgeon comes in and agrees with the procedure. He comes back a little later and brings with him the assistant and something called a papoose to restrain her. Teri and I have explained to Nastia what is going to happen and we think she can handle it. They think differently and they wrap her up in this thing, which turns out to be a good idea.
After they wrap her up in a sheet and put Velcro straps around her the doctor checks out the wound and Nastia begins to squirm and cry. We tell her to close her eyes and she doesn’t hear us. Teri moves closer to her head and talks to her about closing her eyes. When she finally closes her eyes it is better until the Doctor begins to inject the Novocain into her cut to numb it more than the cream did. She starts an all out unrestrained crying and in some ways it was OK. It still kills us that we could do nothing to stop her pain. Elena remained at Nastia’s side watching all of this and when she turns away I motion for her to look at what is going on. I then realize I am again being a bad parent. I may want her to see the results of what she has caused, but I didn’t have to be cruel. I pick her up and hold her asking her if she is all right and I try to convince myself that I am not a cold hearted person. I talk with Elena about what is going on and ask her if she could do it and I tell her there is nothing to be afraid of. Elena is a tough little girl, she got her ears pierced without the drama Nastia went through. She got into the chair first and knowing only a little about the pain factor faced it and was fine about it.
After the shots in the wound Nastia was given a few seconds to compose herself and the Doctor starts in with cutting the ragged skin away. Nastia doesn’t react to this. Later she will work herself up into another crying fit but it was obvious she felt nothing. After cutting away the skin the Doctor cauterizes the wound, burns the wound to stop the blood from flowing, Nastia feels nothing and has no reaction. When the Doctor goes to sew the wound closed that is when she goes off the deep end and starts crying. She may have cried a lot, but she never shook her head and made it impossible for the Doctor to do his job.
After it is over she recovers quickly and again wants to play her game. She has played it off and on during the three hours we were there. Thank God for the electronic babysitter.
We meet Donald and Nancy, Amanda and Thasha out front of the Hospital. They are invited to come back to the house for pizza and to watch a movie and this night is ended by watching Cloudy with a chance of meatball