Saturday morning started off innocently enough. Arran's soccer practice was at 9am and James took him, with Bryttain joining the excursion, to hang out with daddy and watch her big brother. I finished my breakfast and decided I should tackle the mountain of clean laundry that needed folding, I had, after all, procrastinated long enough. Asia was busy playing, but had transferred the play stable with some other toys to our bedroom floor so that she could play and be with me at the same time.
She is such a sweet, chubby-cheeked nugget of love. As the piles of folded clothes grew larger on our bed I remember her saying
"Mommy, I found a bead!"
I did not think too much of it, she is after all my third child and we have never had any untoward incidents with beads. Of course, all of that was about to change. I have no idea what went through that little girl's head, or why. It would maybe have made sense if she had snuck it into her mouth, would a pink bead taste like strawberry, or some other tasty pink morsel? But no! The next thing I hear is her crying and it was then that she informed me that the bead was stuck up her nose!
I felt so bad for her, she was obviously in pain, but I could not see it. I spent the next half an hour trying to get her to blow her nose, no, not sniff, blow (two years old, remember), sneeze, cough...anything. I wanted to see if I could gently massage it down from the outside, but she complained that it hurt. The tears were increasing.
I went online and found it to be quite a common problem, although it seems raisins and peanuts are equally as popular with young children for sticking up noses. Several pages I found suggested a simple CPR type maneuver where you press on the empty nostril and gently blow in the mouth to see if that will dislodge the blockage. That did not work either and she was none too impressed. Soccer practice was due to be over so I called James; I needed fresh ideas.
We tried all the previous suggestions again, with one of us (trying) to hold her still this time. By now we could see the evil bead, as daddy had brought his flashlight in from his truck, but that thing was not budging. With the flashlight we could clearly see the hole in the bead, so her airway was not being badly obstructed and James thought that with a thin enough piece of wire he could maybe hook it out, but she was pretty freaked out and very much over the whole ordeal. She did not want anything else going up her nose.
I finally decided that we were probably going to need some professionals, so got on the phone with an advice nurse to see if we could get her in to the Saturday pediatric clinic. I had no desire whatsoever to head to an ER where we would be kept waiting for goodness knows how long and (this is America after all) end up paying who knows how much? There was an appointment available for later that afternoon, so I took it, but I was still reluctant to declare defeat. I knew it would be way more traumatic for her to have some stranger poking around her nose and to be honest it was not exactly how I had envisioned spending our Saturday afternoon together.
As James made the kiddos lunch I had the bright idea to hunt around for one of our bulb syringes. We had used them when the children were smaller to suck out mucus or snot when they had colds and were too young to know how to blow. But could I find one? No! Of course we have not needed to use one in years.
Some good friends live nearby and I figured I would try them as a last resort - they had one, and more importantly knew where it was in their house (amazing)! I jumped in the car and drove over there immediately. They also offered a saline rinse, which sounded like it would be an ordeal to try on a reluctant child, but anything would be worth a try. Their 'grandma' mentioned a sheet wrap if we needed help keeping her still.
I tried sucking the wretched bead out, but she was pretty nervous and would either try to bat it away, or turn her head at the last moment, even with one of us holding her, it was not happening. We both tried. Finally I decided we needed to use a swaddle. I had a piece of stretchy fleece which I lay down on the floor and told her to lay on top of. What a fun game! I put her little arms down by her sides and wrapped her up tight, then as James held her head still and I blocked her legs, her arms contained, four good suctions and that sucker came out! Her panic turned to relief and the ordeal was over.
Lots of hugs and kisses later, the doctor's appointment canceled, we think a lesson was learned. I asked her later that afternoon if she will ever put another bead up her nose and she was very emphatic with her
"NO!"
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