March 18th Gerrit's Dislocated Elbow

Monday was an eventful day. We had a great day of school and work, followed by showers, dinner, F.H.E., and some bonding time. Gerrit's was with his dad out in the front yard. He was helping his dad work on the sand rail and Garth was quizzing him on his spelling words. Gerrit likes to run and sometimes he looses his balance. He usually falls quite gracefully and his knees get the worst of the tumbles. Not Tonight! He fell and used his left hand to break the fall. Instead of breaking the fall, he dislocated his elbow. I was inside drying Emma's hair when a very calm Garth walked into the bathroom and told me what happened. He told me to call someone for Emma because we needed to take Gerrit to the ER. After a short ER wait (only 3 hours) we were told that he didn't have any breaks or fractures and to let the arm rest for a week.

No Problem...right??

Well not if you only have that arm to use. He stayed home from school on Tuesday, and fell inside the house because his arm was in a sling. Stayed home Wednesday and hurt his arm while trying to get up off the floor. That one was bad because he thought he dislocated his elbow again. We dropped Emma off at at friends and headed BACK to the ER. Well that was St. Patrick's day and the ER was CRAZY so we asked Gerrit if it was feeling better and to see if we could just go see Dr. Guthrie the next day. He wasn't hurting as bad anymore so we decided that would be better then sitting in the ER for probably 6-8 hours.

Thursday Gerrit stayed home and we babied the arm all day. At 2:30 I took him to the Dr. and he agreed with me that his arm needed to be in something other than a sling. The sling was messing with his balance. So back the the ER we went. Not in the ER but to the main Kaiser offices in Fresno where the ER is located. He was splinted and was told not to get it wet or take it off for two weeks. YIKES.

We are at Thursday night and we will see how long this will last. Poor Gerrit! He is a trooper though. Hang in there buddy!!!