L'Shana Tovah

To be honest the New Year started off eerily similarly to the way last year ended. With Isabella being sick, David had to go to Rosh Hashanah services as the sole representative of our family. I can't remember a High Holiday service I've missed...EVER. It was odd to stay home, but absolutely necessary. Unfortunately, that meant missing two amazing meals at my in-laws. Fortunately for me, they sent me home a plate of food from each meal.

Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones...

...or legs of tables, for that matter. Isabella is a clutz. THAT we all know. However, the magnitude of her clutziness has reached a new level. We were having some work done on our house and didn't have access to our kitchen for a few days. David was out of town, so I called my sister-in-law Rachel to join me for dinner out. It was a great opportunity to chat and also for Isabella and Madeline to see their cousin Hannah. We were having a great time, but I noticed Isabella was sitting backwards in her chair. I told her a few times to turn around or she might fall. Can you guess what happened next? Of course, she fell. She fell off her chair and landed on the leg of the table on her shoulder. She started crying immediately and holding her arm. Fortunately we were done with dinner and just waiting for the check. I tried to calm her down, which I was able to do, for the most part. I examined her arm and shoulder and didn't see anything unusual. She did, however, tell me she couldn't raise her arm. Also, when I picked her up under her armpits to get her in and out of the car, she screamed bloody murder. I thought maybe she had a stinger or something so I decided to take her home, ice it down, give her some Children's Motrin and see how she was in the morning. I ended up having her sleep in bed with me so I could keep my eye on her. She whimpered all night - every time she moved. Once we were up the next morning, I asked her how it was feeling. She said it still hurt badly and could raise her arm. At breakfast I noticed she was eating with her left hand (she's right-handed). I decided to call the Doctor as soon as they opened at 8. They asked me if I could get there by 8:30. They warned me that we'd probably have to take her to get x-rays immediately following the appointment, so I prepared myself for that. At the appointment, the doctor made the comment to me that she had a sneaking suspicion Isabella had broken her collarbone. I was stunned. I examined her entire arm and shoulder. I never even considered it might be her collarbone. They put her in a sling and we headed straight to the imaging center (fortunately, it wasn't very far from her Dr.). After a couple of x-rays (which she was an angel for, by the way), they sent us home to wait for a call from her pediatrician with the results.

As I mentioned earlier, they were doing work on our kitchen (and den area), so once we got home, we went straight into the office to set up shop there. After a few minutes, I started to feel REALLY run down (I hadn't slept that night), so much so, that I told Isabella she needed to bring some books and toys into my room so I could lay down. I NEVER do that. About 30 minutes later I had a fever. In the meantime I'd called David (as luck would have it, he was only in Austin - about 90 minutes from here - and he said he'd head home early to help out. I received a call from the pediatrician confirming the worst; her collarbone was broken. By the time David got home, my fever was up to 103 and he insisted I go to a clinic to get checked out (our GP's office closes at noon on Fridays). He put the girls in the car, dropped me off and picked me up when I was done. I was diagnosed with a sinus infection, even though I had no congestion. I thought it was a bit odd, but didn't think anything of it. They prescribed me an antibiotic. Well, I discovered the hard way that I'm allergic to Omnicef. My body did NOT like that medication and was even more miserable than I was before. It was so bad that I went back to the clinic Sunday and was told I had a virus that needed to run it's course. They gave me a steroid to help with the allergic reaction (and it did help after a day or so). The next morning, Isabella woke up with a fever. While mine lasted 3-4 days, hers lasted 7 full days. She developed a cough with hers, lost her voice and was pretty much miserable for an entire week.

As far as the broken clavicle goes, we had to pull her out of soccer (I'm not sure how devastated she was), she missed a couple of weeks of ballet until she could raise her arm again, and it was recommended she wear a sling when she leaves the house. The sling wasn't just to help immobilize her shoulder, but mainly to act as a deterrent for other people to be a little gentler with her. Only a four week recovery, though - we can handle that.

I didn't take any pictures of her during this ordeal because she wasn't exactly in the best mood...