We aren't exactly sure how it happened. We know that when she came home from daycare she was holding her arm a bit strange. My husband moved her arm when he was holding her and she started to cry in a way we'd never heard. He began to examine her arm and discovered that her wrist was purple and a bit swollen.
We took her to our General Practitioner because they have an X-Ray machine. The Doctor discovered that it was a fracture and referred us to an orthopedist.
Unfortunately for us, the pediatric orthopedist was on a week long vacation and the receptionist at the GP did not think it was in our best interest to wait. Lucky for us, her husband is an RN at an orthopedist who specializes in hands. We got an appointment less than 24 hours after her initial Xray. Since she's so young, they had to put a cast all the way up to her armpit. She cried during the whole process even though I'm sure it didn't hurt. E is not a great patient at any doctors appointments.
We were warned by the RN and several people that her arm was going to start getting really smelly by the time her cast came off. I was determined not to let my child be the stinky one at school. I researched ways to keep the cast from smelling and it really all boiled down to not letting it get wet inside or out.
She had about three showers a week and each time her cast was wrapped in a towel at the top of her cast and then a Subway sandwich bag was placed on top. If I felt that it was too damp at the top after the shower, I used the blow dryer on the cool setting and blew air on it. E really seemed to like that. I did not allow her to play outside or do anything that might cause her to sweat. I was a success! She did not smell one bit. (Of course when the cast came off, the area around her palms was another story.)
Her wrist has healed very well and I'm pretty sure she isn't going to need therapy. We have a follow up appointment in a week just to make sure.
I always thought it would be C who would get the fractures or the breaks, but E is definitely proving me wrong in a lot of ways.
