The wound-causing accident occurred as Mom headed for the shower Saturday morning. She apparently brushed against the tile-and-wooden sign on a bookshelf and it fell off, hitting her poor little shin. (The sign, in a note of irony, said "Home Sweet Home." And I'm a bit mortified to realize, I gave it to her.)
Mom called Susan, calming saying, "We need to go somewhere," and Susan rushed over. I'll spare details of the crime -- I mean accident -- scene. Suffice to say there was a lot of the red stuff involved, and it wasn't pretty.
Susan drove our very calm mother to the emergency-care clinic nearby, and then the text messages between her, our sister Jeanne, brother Ben, and me began.
The first came after Susan took this picture of Mom. You can see how she's looking intently at what the technician is doing.
Susan: "Always smiling. Home Sweet Home sign fell on Mom's leg."
Ben: "Oh, no! Stitches?"
Susan: "No stitches. Open wound. Doc hasn't come in yet."
Me: "What does that mean, open wound? Don't they want to close it?"
Jeanne: "My head is between my knees. It's just as well I'm not there. I'd be the daughter in the next examining room with oxygen."
Me: "Haha and I'd be fighting you for the spigot."
Susan then sent us all the picture of the shin wound, which I will spare you (and me).
Susan: "Enjoy."
Me: "I'm going to put in stitches if no one else will. And then I'm going to throw up."
Susan: "Hahahaha. Maybe 'open wound' is the wrong term. Skin tear?"
Jeanne: "Hmm. Maybe worse."
Ben: "Looks like more of a scrape to me."
Me: "Artery rip?"
Susan: "Doctor said deep gash, some clots. Ugh. I want to go home."
Me: "Why did the doctor have to say CLOTS? I'm down for the count."
Susan: "It doesn't help that she takes a baby aspirin."
Ben: "Has Mom gotten the doctor's life story yet?"
Me: "He's coming over for Thanksgiving. And I'm going to purge the baby aspirin I just ate."
Susan: "Poor Mom. It hurts. She has no questions for the doctors, just kind comments."
Me: "Chuckles (my son Charlie) said, 'If we could incorporate Oma's personality to everyone in the world, there would be world peace.' "
Susan: "Tell Chuckles to button it. You can't imagine how deep the cut is. Scary."
There's a few more back and forth texts -- some silly, some not, including (for instance) TV doctors and neighborhood doctors, none of whom we've seen in decades, but all of whom 'each of us remembered with much amusement.
Susan: "Two docs are in there now. Mom's amazing. She's watching the whole thing. They can't sew it. The skin is 'ripping.' "
And then, "It's OK. Stitched. Just the top of the wound isn't holding together. She has to keep it elevated and iced."
You can see how the texts start out with one medical theory -- a scrape that can't be stitched -- and how that changes. Mostly though, what struck me as we were typing, and what strikes me now reading them again, is the comfort and camaraderie and amusement that comes with being a sibling in a tight-knit family. And yes, how very lucky I am.
Not long after Susan's last text, Jeanne sent this photo to all of us.
It's Mom at the birthday party for Jeanne's grandson (Mom's great-grandson) Eli V.
She didn't stay there long -- just enough to have some cake and kiss the birthday boy. Oh yes, and to enthusiastically recount how the doctor lifted the skin on her shin, and she could see the bone at the base of the gash.
No comments:
Post a Comment