Stitches

Today was probably Jonah's most traumatic day in his 25+ months of life. He slipped and smashed his chin, cutting it open. There was blood in his mouth (it turned out he also bit his tongue), down his neck, on his shirt, on me. The blood stopped fairly quickly, but we took him to the doctor's office and ended up getting seven stitches -- two internal and five external. This all happened just before nap time, and Jonah was not happy.

The two hours at the doctor's office were pretty hard. Jonah is a tough kid, and he was up and about afterwards wearing his backpack and marching back to the car. He is a squirmer, though. The doctor said she has handled worse, but we came close to heading to the ER to knock him out.

You might wonder how one puts stitches in a two-year-old. Wrap him up in a sheet like a burrito, shoulders to knees, so he can't move his arms. Nurse holds his head, dad holds his body and legs, mom tries to keep his attention, and doctor does her work. Jonah really does not like being constrained, as Michele and I know. He was very, very scared and very, very brave.

From my vantage point, I had a perfect view of the stitching. It was a much deeper cut than any of us thought at first. I looked into my son's wound, his flesh. It was dark inside, a little hole in my child's face.

It should heal pretty well. We need to keep it mostly covered with waterproof band-aids for five days, when the stitches should be dissolved. The doctor said we can reduce scarring by massaging in vitamin E and keeping the area out of the sun after the scab goes away. Fortunately, the cut is under his chin and a bit back. Most people will never see it, but I'll know it is there.