Damon's Injury

Today I picked Damon up early to take him to see his dad for the weekend. When I got to his school the class was taking a bathroom break so they were all standing in a line in the hallway...Damon was crying. I went over to him and asked what was wrong. After getting no response from him I looked at his teacher and asked what happened? Damon is not a cry baby so I knew something was up. The teacher told me he got hurt on the playground-a kid accidentally poked him in the eye. I asked Damon to show me his eye and he couldn't open in. I explained that I needed to see his eye and that he needed to open it for me. The only way that he could do that was to pry it open with his own hands and at that point I knew it wasn't good. When he finally got his eye opened he would scream with pain, close his eye and put his hand over it. Now Damon doesn't usually have to go to the doctors except for the occasional sick visit which is maybe once a year and then of course for his yearly child's check up. After calling about three doctors offices I was finally able to get a doctor that could see him today...it was however 3:30 so I was very lucky to get an appointment that wasn't at the urgent care or the emergency room. I just loathe those places.

When waiting for the doctor in the exam room I try to keep Damon's anxiety down so I get the tongue depressors and sword fight with him, then I'll get a glove and blow it up into a small balloon. When the doctor came in Damon of course got very chatty with nervousness and started telling the doctor random facts like:

"My mom always drops her stick (tongue depressor)"
"I'm going to see my dad today"
"I had wacky dress day"

Poor thing! I explained to the doctor what happened at school and he said okay Damon I'm going to make you feel better. I need to look at your eye but after he opened it and Damon let out a yelp, he looked at me and said "we need to numb his eye". Ugh! Damon heard that and freaked out as the doctor got the eye drops out. I literally had to lay my body over him and hold his head while the doctor pulled his eye open and put the drops in. You could tell Damon felt immediate relief as he stopped screaming and just laid there. Next the doctor had to scrape his eye and put dye in it. I could not watch it so I just held Damon's hand, talked to him, and looked the other way. The doctor then turned the lights out and put a blue light on and said "Yep, Damon has a corneal abrasion." He then let me look and I got to see the small hole in his eye. It was pitiful. The good news is it's not severe enough that a few drops a day can't help. Damon sat up and the doctor said "See Damon, I told you I would make you feel better." Damon looked at him and said "I know that but do not do it again." The doctor then whispered to me "the numbing will wear off in a few hours and he's going to be hurting again." That broke my heart.

We left, got our stickers and suckers, and met Damon's dad in the parking lot. Since it was a minor injury I was okay with Damon leaving me for the weekend. I always like to be with him when he is sick but he really wanted to go with his Dad and I was happy to let him...I don't have to put the drops in his eyes this weekend!

I asked Drew to put a patch on Damon's eye if he goes outside or if any kids or animals are around him and while he sleeps. I didn't want to take a chance on it getting worse or irritated.