Through the ringer

Last week was a pretty rough one for our poor Anne Cakes.

It started Sunday morning (25 November) when she fell off of the top bunk in the boys' room.  Anne has always been a climber and has been so good about getting down from high places.  She is self-taught on stairs.  I never had to help her go down a flight of stairs and she's never had a problem.  Bunk beds, we've started to learn, are a bit different.  Apparently the ladder is a little too much of a challenge.

Spencer went to take care of Anne while I hopped in the shower.  He held her pretty much the rest of that time.  I got her after that and noticed a couple of splinters.  Spencer dug those out and Anne's foot was still pretty sore and she wouldn't walk on it.  She was crawling around, though, so we went ahead to church.  We decided I would see how she was Monday morning and go from there.

Monday she still wasn't putting any weight on her foot.  I called the pediatrician's office and they told me to go get X-rays.  So that morning Andy, Lilia, Anne, and I spent two hours at an urgent care so Anne could get her X-rays done.  Unfortunately, with no radiologist there to read the images, things were still inconclusive.  The doctor decided to splint the foot and told us to see our PCP for a referral to an orthopedist.  That became our Tuesday.

Monday with her splint.

Long story short, we ended up at the orthopedist and were told that there may or may not be a fracture; it's hard to tell if the line on the image is a fracture or a bone overlay.  However the possible fracture combined with Anne's behavior with the splint off (refusal to put her heel on the ground when hobbling around) are indicative of a distal tibia stress injury.  To be safe, the PA we met with said he'd like to have a short-leg cast for three weeks to give the time to heal whatever is going on.

Here she is showing off her "pink sock."
(so glad I decided to go with pink.  It suits her.)

Full of smiles!

Not being slowed down at all.

Anne still climbs on everything and basically runs around with the cast.  It did take her a couple of days to acclimatize, but I am amazed at how well she is getting around.

Thursday brought our next incident with Anne.  I was getting the kids ready for bed (Spencer was at a dinner for medical students who were here interviewing for residency) and on my way to brush someone's teeth in the bathroom.  Anne had a toothbrush in her mouth in the hallway and Benny was shutting the bathroom door.  Anne started screaming.  Poor Benny got a panicked look on his face and opened the door again.  Anne's fingers had gotten caught in the hinge side of the door.  She was quite inconsolable for a little bit.  Benny felt so bad.  He said he was just trying to keep Anne out of the bathroom because she had been getting into the toothpaste.  I felt really bad for Benny, too.

The injured fingers.

While I was trying to comfort Anne and read stories to Andy and Lilia, I saw Benny get a piece of paper and begin writing at the kids' table.  Afterwards, he came up and showed me what he had done.

It reads (with translation):

I love Anne! to Anne From Benny

Dear Anne I'm almost [always] there [home] Saturdays

and Sundays. I watch you when

Mom and Dad when they are busy.

From Benny

With his picture of the two of them.

He told me he did this to help her feel better.  He was quite distraught.

Then came Friday.

During story time I was on the couch reading to the bigger kids and Spencer was on the glider with Anne climbing around.  At one point she fell head-first into the ottoman and split her lip.  Thankfully it wasn't too bad and she calmed down more quickly than after the finger episode.  The picture is a little deceptive, though, as she was not very happy and went back to crying after I put my phone away.

All said and done, Anne had a pretty rough week.  We are grateful she is such a happy girl naturally and is back (almost) to normal.  Under two weeks and the cast will be off.  I'm really not all that surprised that our first to end up in a cast is our little Anne Peg.  She is everywhere!