Friday, September 17, 2010

How We Spent Our Thursday


I had plans for Thursday afternoon, but Quinn breaking the radius bone in his left forearm made me drop all that stuff. He fell at the daycare's playground, and when he broke his fall by putting out his arms, the left forearm apparently got the brunt of his weight, which bowed it out considerably as you can see.

The medical staff in the ER called it a "green stick" break, meaning that because little kids' bones are so rubbery, the bone will break on one side, but the other side will simply bend. The term comes from when you have a green tree limb and bend it, and it breaks on one side, but most of the limb bends without breaking.

Both Mrs. Nasty and I have never broken a bone [knock on wood], so this was all new stuff for us. Thankfully, Quinn didn't require surgery, but the "reducing" of his arm was strange on a couple of levels.

One of the sedatives he was given for pain is related to LSD, so when that drug went into his system, he went into this eery, stupified stare.

Then once he was fully out, the orothopedic surgeon simply took his little forearm and forcefully pushed on it to bend it back into shape. The "after" x-ray is impressive. It's straight as heck.

The poor little guy is in a soft cast right now, but he'll get a hard cast on Tuesday.

2 comments:

Babe Runner said...

Woah. I mean, WOAH. I hope he recovers soon. Actually, given how bendy his bones appear to be in the x-ray (which is both fascinating and horrifying to look at), he probably will recover astoundingly quickly. No six weeks off from running for HIM, thank you very much.

Quintilian B. Nasty said...

I just hope he keeps safe while he has this soft cast on. The hard cast will provide more protection.