Appendix Drahaaammaaa!

So, last night was fun…if you call spending three hours in the UK Emergency Room with a 10 year old who might or might not be having appendicitis fun.

Anyhow, here’s how it all went down.

Flea started having right side pains after dinner and was pretty wimpy acting. After a few hours he was still feeling no relief. Of course, Hubbit was at the firestation for 24 hours so I didn’t have my go-to-medical professional to consult and was forced to call the on-call nurse for advice.

Firewives can testify to this. If your kid is going to randomly get a concussion at the swimming pool at the hands of a pretty little Asian 6 year old girl, if your dog is going to completely bite through your hand (accidentally) on Christmas Eve, if your only toilet is going to quit working OR if your washing machine is going to flood your house… IT WILL happen on the 24 hours your husband is on shift. It’s like a law of nature. I learned to accept it within the first year of him being on the line.

Side note: As I was on the phone with the on-call nurse, Bug grabbed our “homework white board” and drew what may have been the most accurate picture of an appendix ever drawn by a 7 year old. Heh! I hung up with the on-call nurse as Bug stepped in front of us with his odd drawing and announced, “I’m going to teach you all about the appendix”. Um. Ok.

The real kicker was that he’d drawn a second picture of a dead cartoon boy and wrote something to the effect of “if appendix hurts = (dead boy cartoon)”. Considering we were trying to tell Flea his pain wasn’t something to worry about, this was really bad timing on Bug’s part. Or, really great timing if you’re thinking like a little brother who LOVES to make his big brother miserable.

Back to the story…

Being the awesome Grand-Mall (as Bug calls her) she is, Gigi agreed to go with me and Flea to the ER while Pappy babysat Bug. It was almost bedtime so I figured Bug would give Pappy some peace and just go to sleep. Boy, was I wrong! Poor Pappy. I have no idea what happened while we were gone but when we left for the ER, Pappy looked rested and youthful and when I got back home, he looked like he’d been ran over by a 7-year-old-appendix-drawing-semi-truck. (Side note: Thanks Daddy! )

The highlight of the ER trip had to be when Gigi got hot and had to remove ONE of her shoes. Just one. Then she proceeded to show us how high she could kick her leg with her shoe on and with her shoe off. Oddly enough, the shoe did help her get more height but Flea and I just couldn’t understand why she wanted to show us this skill in the first place.

Of course, she had been doing Ninja kicks ever since we’d all gone to the Ninja Lego event a few hours before. I kind of wish I’d gotten it on video because she was even wearing a black-ninja-head-band-thingy. It was another $10,000 moment down the drain. Drats!

Hmm, I wonder how tough she’d be if we also taught her the Judy Chop. She could be…dangerous! ;) (Side note: I love my Momma!)

After some x-rays, a lot of tummy pushing, a Strep test, a urine sample, doctor ordered vanilla ice cream (lucky kid), way too much George Lopez on Nick at Nite via the ER television and Gigi’s entertaining Ningy Kicks, Flea was diagnosed…with something that he probably would shoot me if I blogged about.

Why did I make that initial promise to try not to embarrass him?!

I’ll just say his entire problem can be fixed with additional fiber.(giggle)

Whitney

To an adolescent, there is nothing in the world more embarrassing than a parent.(Dave Barry)