Cole's Need for Excitement

Many of you have followed Cole's saga over the last week on Facebook. I can't thank you enough for all the texts, calls, and prayers! I know it doesn't seem like a big deal but it could have been a serious issue and God definitely had his hand on our boy. I am so thankful for that!


For those that have somehow not heard the crazy story...here is a recap. Last Wednesday evening around 5 all the kids came in from playing outside and I was trying to get them ready to head out the door for AWANA. Crosby was laying in the floor in the living room and Cole headed in there to see him. I was talking on the phone at the time and headed in there as well. I immediately noticed a big gold screw in his mouth, got on to him to get it out and took it out myself. Then the next 20 seconds seemed to drag on for 20 minutes. I am not being dramatic, but I play it over and over in my head and it is crazy! I told my mom on the phone I had to go and tried not to freak her out or the other kids, but I saw a smaller screw in his mouth. I told him to get it out and he leaned back away from me and layed down on the floor and this is when I got nervous. I saw the screw go to the back of his throat and I scooped his head off the floor and stuck my finger in his mouth to get the screw out. I was too late. To this day, I am not convinced I didn't push it down his throat.


He cried for a bit, but I am not sure it isn't because I just had my finger in his throat. I calmly yelled (oxymoron) for one of the big boys to get me some water and called Cory. I got Cole to drink the water and calmed him down. Cory was great and kept me calm and formulated a plan. Cole wasn't choking so he wasn't in immediate danger, but we knew we needed to go to the ER and get things checked out and possibly get that screw out. So I loaded up everyone and headed to church. I told a few good friends the situation and made arrangements for my Cubbies class and for my kids. If I wasn't done at the ER they would all be watched until Cory got done with his bus route. I have AMAZING friends!


So I headed to the ER. We got an x-ray and sure enough it was there! The ER doc acted like it wasn't that big of a deal, kids swallow all kinds of things he said. I felt a little better about the situation. He told me the screw had already passed the two areas of big concern and was passed his stomach. So now we just had to wait for the screw to pass. He suggested we get repeat x-rays every two days to check on it. I asked him about us going on vacation Saturday and the doctor acted like it would be no problem and it should pass by then. He wrote orders to get x-rays on Friday.


I watched him all day Thursday and Friday morning. I checked dirty diapers all day :( NO FUN!!! Our family doctor was not in the office Friday so we waited until the end of the day to do x-ray and then no one at the hospital would read them. We weren't sure what to do next. We didn't have a doctor's opinion and were getting lots of conflicting opinions from others. We were heading to Grapevine on Saturday. Cory decided while we were there we would go to a Children's Hospital ER and get a specialist's opinion.

Here is a shot of one of Friday's x-rays

We headed to Dallas Children's Hospital early Sunday morning and went through the usual registration, triage, etc. We got three different x-rays and the residents and attendings opted for a GI consult. At first we were told we would have to have surgery to get it out. We were sent to observation for a couple of hours to wait for an OR to open. Then we finally got to talk to the GI doctor and after talking decided the screw was most likely to far down for her to get with her scope and it would be a longer wait, sedation, and surgery for nothing. We decided it was best to not go that route. She also gave us the option to be admitted and do a "clean-out" there. But Cole was playing fine and showing NO symptoms the entire time. So we didn't do that either. We checked out and were given an over the counter laxative to give him.

We were in the ER at Dallas Children's Hospital on Sunday for about 6 hours. Cole was a trooper, but finally crashed around 12:45pm and took a good nap on my lap for almost 2 hours.

We played at Great Wolf Lodge all evening Sunday, shopped Monday morning, and traveled home. I pumped a few doses of laxative in him Tuesday and out it came that afternoon around 2pm! Praise God! He seemed fine and didn't really fuss at all. I am so thankful for all the prayers and concern and I am EXTREMELY thankful to God for keeping my little ornery boy safe! I am reminded that I am not SUPER MOM and I need to slow down and watch my kids more. I cannot multitask everything! Take time to watch your kids, play with them, interact with them, etc. The cleaning, laundry, etc can wait! I know boys will be boys, but I want my boys here as long as I can have them!

Here is shot of the the screw! I cleaned it up well and the nickel is just for comparison! This is definitely going in the baby book!