ER Visit

Well, we had to make a trip to the ER last night. After the evening service at church, Mark was talking with people about the camp program or the upcoming men's retreat & I was in a meeting planning a luau for the last night of AWANA. We were both interrupted with reports that Joshua was hurt outside. Turns out that he had been running a race (obstacle course) with 2 other boys along a stretch of sidewalk and took a spill. He says he was in a rocky area where they removed some trees (but not stumps) from last year when he fell. Mark had brought him into the nursery and had guaze taped to the wound by the time I got in there. We had several nurse or paramedics that had looked at in before he covered it and said it was going to need stitches. So after leaving Stephen & Rachel in the care of our friends, Mark & Lisa Ellison, we raced to the ER with only a momentary stop home for his pillow buddy, Diego.
The ER doc ordered xrays to check for any additional damage or foreign objects but all was fine there. He then had to clean and stitch up a "corner" gash. It is about 1 1/4 inches horizontal under his knee and then 3/4 to 1 in. vertical. They gave Joshua some nitrus oxide to help him relax and not move while they worked on it. He still did quite a bit of crying while they were injecting the site with numbing med but after that did quite well. It took either 9 or 10 stitches. There are only 8 visible from the outside but I am sure that the dr. did 1 or 2 under the skin first that are not visible now because I know I saw him with 2 different color sutures.
They said that Joshua could go to school today but it was after 10 when we left the ER and none of us had eaten dinner yet. We swung by Meijers for fresh bandages, Wendy's for dinner, and then picked up the other kids before we go home around 10:45. We was about 11:30 before we headed to bed. Joshua's leg hurt pretty bad and so we put him in bed with us for the night. That worked till his meds wore off about 3 a.m. I gave him more pain meds but he just won't settle down so he and I came downstairs. I laid him in a chair in the living room so I could clean off the couch for him to sleep on but he got rather comfortable there and didn't want to go to the couch. So he and I spent the rest of the night sleeping downstairs. I felt it was too much for him to go to school with that little bit of sleep and not knowing how it might feel when the meds wore off again. It is rather a good thing I didn't send him. He is having quite a bit of pain still this morning. The wound looks fine but I think it might be some soreness to the knee or muscle around it that is hurting. So he is just resting with his leg up and watching his Go, Diego, Go! DVD.
I forgot to mention something a little strange that happened at the ER. They have this nurse who comes through and explains everything to the kids and helps them understand what the doctor is going to do so that they aren't scared. When she walked in to the room last night, by the time she got done with the introduction she said that we looked familiar. She was the same one that saw Stephen the last time he was in for stitches. That was several years ago though and for her to recognize us I thought rather amazing. She is now buddies with both boys because after Joshua's procedure last night she brought him a slushie and also a "Huggable Diego" toy as a prize for being brave and following the directions we had for him. She gave Stephen a little block set but he makes friends with all the ER workers.