Once upon a time, a little family went to a campground for 4 days. It was filled with trees, ninja mosquitos, unstable gravel walkways, rattlesnakes, and mud puddles. After this 4 day period, the 6 year old son and his family went home with nothing worse than a sunburn and a few scrapes on his knees and hands. Very normal for a 6 year old boy.
Then, after driving all night and arriving home at 3 AM, this family slept in a bit. The mother woke up at around 10:30 and went downstairs to a strange sight.
She noticed a partial roll of toilet paper on the kitchen counter that was spotted with blood. Next to that roll of toilet paper was a box of band-aids. She looked up from this odd sight to see the boy's Epi-Pen partially protruding from its protective case. She tried to push it back inside the case and close it up, but it wouldn't budge. She pulled out the Epi-Pen and inspected it, and then she noticed why it couldn't fit back into its case. It had been deployed.
She felt a little chill settle into the pit of her stomach as she started putting the puzzle pieces together: Bloody toilet paper, band-aids, and a clearly deployed Epi-Pen.
She called her son upstairs from the TV room and asked him the obvious question: "CT, did you mess with your Epi-Pen this morning?"
He looked up at her and said: "No."
She then confronted him full-on: "CT, I found a roll of toilet paper with blood on it, a box of band-aids and this [holding up the Epi-Pen] has obviously been set off. What happened?"
CT knew he was caught, and admitted: "Well, the needle sort of went through my nail."
The mother looked at his hand, and sure enough, the Epi-Pen's needle had gone all the way through his thumb and even partially through his forefinger.
Yes, CT had apparently woken up that morning, gotten himself breakfast, gotten a hold of his Epi-Pen, took out the safety peg at the end, placed his hand too near the needle end, and hit the kitchen counter with it, activating the spring-loaded needle and sending it through two of his fingers. Then, instead of coming to his parents for help, he had tried to cover the whole thing up. He mopped up his own blood, wrapped his wounds in band-aids, and tried to put the Epi-Pen back into its case. He even replaced it on the microwave where it had been before the whole incident took place. The mother, though appalled by his attempts at deception, couldn't help but be at least a little impressed by his survivial instincts.
I mean think about it: A six year old boy hadn't screamed or cried at all when a huge needle went all the way through his thumb and finger. He had simply pulled out the needle and patched himself up as best he could.
Either way, the mother consulted the boy's father about what had happened, and they agreed that he should be taken to the Instacare to make sure everything was OK. The doctor assured the mother that CT would be fine. She could then relax a little, and give CT a proper chewing out for that morning's events. She can only hope that he has learned an important lesson and WILL NOT be messing with his Epi-Pen again.
The End
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Personally I just can't figure out how that kid made it through four whole days of running around a campground without any major injuries and then, within 7 hours of being home he puts a massive needle all the way through his thumb! Seriously, what the crap?!?!?
sounds like a typical boy to me. Curious and self resourceful.
ReplyDeleteGlad he is okay from the adventure.
Did you really see rattlesnakes? Scary
Mynx: Yeah, those two words describe him quite accurately. There's never a dull moment with him around!
ReplyDeleteWe didn't actually SEE any rattlesnakes, but we did hear one, just outside of our little cabin. It was creepy.
I think I would cry if that happened to me.
ReplyDeleteMy daughter did a similar thing once. We had been camping for three days, then went to my brother's house to stay for a couple more before going home. She was fine and dandy while camping, but within ten minutes of being at my brother's house, she'd smashed her fingers between two hand weights and we ended up in the emergency room. Fun was had by all. The end.
ReplyDeleteBryan: I know I'd freak right out if it happened to me. I'm terrified of needles when they DON'T go shooting straight through two of my appendages. I would have been hyperventilating and possibly passed out before I even thought to take the thing out. That makes his reaction that much more impressive to me.
ReplyDeleteBrent: Ouch! That poor girl!
Why do things happen that way? I mean, as soon as the parents' guard is down, that's when the worst stuff happens to their kids. We expect injuries and accidents to happen in the middle of the woods, then once we get home we stop worrying. Apparently, we need to find a way to reverse such thinking, because clearly we have it backwards.
I take it then that either the medication had no effect or it didn't dispense? That seems scary. I'm happy to hear that he is ok.
ReplyDeleteGeorge: We got lucky. I saw that the medication did dispense, but I don't think it was completely injected into his system. You're supposed to hold the epi-pen inside the leg for 10 seconds so the medication can be injected properly, and I think he must have pulled the needle out much sooner than that, so it didn't affect him as much as it could have. But yeah, we were definitely lucky this time. It could have been so much worse.
ReplyDeleteAlright. I think I got it.
ReplyDeleteAn Epi-Pen is some sort of stabbing needle contraption.
Why a child needs a spring loaded needle, I have no idea. But you say it is HIS. Therefore...he gets stabbed with it regularly, I assume, though probably not through his hand.
Question: if he knows what the Epi-Pen does...why on earth was he playing with it?
And my other question: how does a six year old mutilate himself like that and not scream for help?
Chanel: An Epi-Pen is an auto-injector filled with a dose of epinephrine to be used ONLY if he goes into anaphylaxis. Caden has a severe allergy to peanuts, and the epi-pen is meant to help hold off anaphylactic shock long enough to get him to the hospital. It's for emergencies only, and (fortunately) we haven't needed to use one yet. (Here's hoping we never will!)
ReplyDeleteAnyway, he had an idea what the epi-pen is and what it does, I guess he just got too curious for his own good this time. However, I'm pretty darn sure he won't be "exploring" his epi-pen again anytime soon.
I have NO IDEA how he didn't start screaming when he did that to himself! I'm still flabbergasted about it. Personally, with all the evidence at my disposal that showed his efforts to HIDE the accident, I think his fear of getting into trouble for messing with that thing in the first place kept him quiet. We didn't punish him though. We figured he'd been punished enough by his own actions. All we had to do was give him a lecture about NEVER DOING IT AGAIN!!!
Still, I'm a full-grown woman and I would have flat out PANICKED if something like that happened to me! I was just reeling about his reaction to the whole thing. Absolutely crazy!