Back in the Blogospere .... AGAIN!

17 days ago I broke my elbow, and I'm finally feeling up to blogging again...

I broke my elbow falling down the stairs holding Audrey.  So not to fall on her, I kept her upright, and landed on my other side.  A direct hit to the inside ball of my right elbow.  We had workmen in the house replacing our boiler.  They had thrown a bunch of scraps out front, and some guy was at the front door gesturing like he wanted to take the metal.  Our boiler is on the 4th floor, so I had run all the way up there to grab one of the guys, and was running all the way back down.  I slipped on the second or third step from the bottom right outside our kitchen, and landed on the ceramic tile.

At first I thought I had just hit my funny bone.  But the pain was insane.  It hurt to move at all, even if I thought I was keeping my arm still.  And it just continued to intensify.  Matt rushed home from work, and we had our friend Maureen come over to stay with the girls, so we could go to the hospital.  I would by lying if I didn't say I had several minor freak outs on the way to the hospital.  I was almost certain I was going to need surgery, they were going to have to put me under and I didn't even say good bye to the girls.  Poor Matt having to listen to me and drive.....

We had never been to the hospital in Brussels before, but had heard some positive stories of experiences others have had.  Matt dropped me off at the emergency room, and went to park the car.  I walked in and found my way to the check in.  Once Matt got there, we were immediately taken back to be examined.  Two different people looked me over - I don't know if they were doctors or nurses, but I have to guess doctors, as you don't see very many nurses here.  I was having a hard time with the pain and describing where it was exactly.  They took me to have xrays, and twisted me every which way and took at least 5 different pictures.  We waited about 5 minutes, and they had the results and whisked me to the casting room.  Casting was uncomfortable, to say the least.  At one point, I told someone in the room that the pain was worse then child birth.  When they were done, I argued with them about the state of my cast.  It was only plaster on the bottom, and just gauze on top.  I was like...'uh, where's the rest?'  I thought we were having language issues.  But eventually another doctor confirmed that it was right.  I wasn't convinced.

So we were sent home, with the weakest pain pill prescription EVER.  Ibuprofen 400!  WHAT?  I at least got 800 when I had the girls!!  Anyway.....  Katie and India hightailed it over from London the next day.  We were not sure how the pain was going to be, so they hung out with us for the weekend, and then we loaded up 3 small children and a weeks worth of 'stuff' into a Prius and made the drive to London on Sunday.  It was really an easy drive, all things considered, and really cool to take the car train across the Chunnel.

What a blessing to have Katie so close.  She was a life saver!  For all of us.  Matt is so busy with work right now, and the last thing he needed was to play nurse maid.  We had planned on being in London towards the end of the week anyway because he had meetings, so it worked out well.  We were all able to travel back to Brussels the following Sunday on the Eurostar.

So now to continue catching up....

Up next, our visit to Quincy.

Then we'll do Florida, London/Windsor, and the Brussels 2012 Flower Carpet.  All before the first day of school on Wednesday!!!  Lots of catching up to do!!  Thank God I can use my right hand/arm again.  Mostly.  The cast came off last Monday, and every day it gets a little bit better.  I go back in a week for another examination of how I'm healing.  Turns out the cast was only needed to control the pain and really not to aide in healing.  Only time can heal.