Dance Family: Kenzie's Broken Arm

On November 23rd, Kenzie broke both bones in her lower right arm. We were at the park and she and Nati were doing aerials. On the last one she did she fell backwards after landing and landed on her right arm and did a backwards somersault. She was with Michelle (which was really good timing, because her, Nati, and Cam were at the park a lot by themselves. I don't know how they would have handled it if Michelle wasn't there) so Michelle called me (I was playing pickleball) and told me Kenzie broke her arm and asked me to meet her at the parking lot. I sent Sam to find Doug who was playing tennis and tell him what happened. But I forgot to tell them where to meet us so they ran around the park looking for us and finally came by the parking lot and found us by the car. While we were waiting for them Kenzie passed out for a few seconds. Chelle and I had both been supporting her so we caught her and then Chelle helped her sit on my lap. Doug and I took her to the ER and the rest of the family took care of our other kids.

Once we got to the ER we waiting forever to be able to go back. Kenzie was really pale and pretty shaky. Once we let her start watching Parent Trap on my phone she was doing a little better since she wasn't just focusing on her broken arm. I also put my sweatshirt around her to help warm her up.

When we finally got into a room they said only one of us could go back with her. I went back with her and Doug spent the next 5 hours (other then when he went to eat dinner) in the waiting room and car (we should have just sent him home or had someone come pick him up, but we didn't realize it would take so long). They got her into a comfy bed and gave her a heated blanket. They found us a remote since my phone was close to out of battery so she could watch TV. They took x-rays and found that she broke both lower arm bones and one of them needed to be put back in place.

They hooked her up to an IV (which she was really scared about since before when she had had an IV it hurt a lot, but they used a small one this time and it didn't hurt as badly). The nurse kept saying how good Kenzie did with the IV and that she was better than most adults. They couldn't find a yellow tube they needed before they could drug her up to try to set the bones. It took probably an hour for them to finally find something that would make it work even though they didn't ever find the yellow tube.

Kenzie acting as though she's dead.

Feeling scared.

Smiling.

All ready to start the procedure. The sedative didn't work as well as expected. They usually give kids half of the amount they gave her and she still never was fully asleep. She says she remembers saying ow. She also told them she was almost ready (I think that was before they gave her more of the sedative.) They had her count backwards from 10 and she was still awake when she was done. But I guess she was out enough for them to try to set the bone. However, they weren't able to do it. They said we would need to take her to an orthopedic surgeon to fix it. They splinted her arm for the time being. As they were splinting it she asked a couple times if people were going to be able to sign the splint:) She also talked a lot more to them then before she was drugged up.

The ER doctor contacted Banner Children's Hospital. The hospital said they had a bed for Kenzie, but they needed to send something to the ER doctor to make it official. We waited hours for them to send it. The ER doctor called them and they said they were really busy, but they'd send it when they could. But after a couple hours they said they actually didn't have a bed. The ER doctor said that we had a few options. We could stay at the ER until a bed opened up, we could go to a hospital in Phoenix which usually has beds available (this option might have been a bit more appealing if it wasn't 11:00 at night and I was worried it would take another couple hours to get that all set up and us over there), or we could just go home and go to Banner early in the morning. We chose option 3. The doctor had been contacting a surgeon who said he could do the surgery in the morning, but we needed to get to the hospital between 5 and 6 am.

Kenzie had some apple juice. She hadn't eaten since 1 or drank much then a few sips of water since then.

This is how she was really feeling. I would ask her to smile for pictures, and she would, but then she'd say but I'm not happy. It wasn't hurting too bad. She never cried from the pain, but cried a little because she didn't want to sleep at the hospital, was scared about surgery and the medication not working, and because she can't do her dance recital or play volleyball anymore. And she's sad she'll have a cast on Christmas.

We finally got home around 11:45, after about 7 hours at the ER. Michelle and my mom had made top ramen for her to eat as soon as she got home. Since she was likely going to have surgery the next day she wasn't allowed to eat or drink after midnight. Cam and Nati had gone to the store with Ashlee (and and maybe Michelle) and found some presents for Kenzie. They also made a poster that everyone signed for her. She was so happy to get them!

After about 4 hours of sleep for Kenzie and maybe 3 for me, we were up and out of the house by 4:50 and got to Banner a little after 5. I brought a backpack with some things to keep us busy if needed and we wore warmer clothes and Kenzie brought her new comfy blanket that her cousins got her. She slept (or maybe just rested) in the waiting room while we waited for a bed to open. We didn't have to wait too long, only about 40 minutes and some of that was with a nurse who took her temperature and blood pressure.

Once we got in the room we watched some TV and tried to sleep. The doctor almost didn't call the surgeon we had been told to call when we got there because he wasn't the normal on call surgeon, but luckily she did because he was already planning on us. So surgery was scheduled for 10:30. The doctor thought we might have to wait to have someone else try to just push the bones back in place, before we could do surgery, but since the surgeon was already expecting us, we didn't have to do that. Kenzie was really scared about it. I was glad to have a plan and a timeline. It could have taken much longer if we had to try to reset the bones first and then schedule the surgery. We were able to sleep a little while we waited for it to be surgery time. Around 9 they took us up to the preoperating room.

Kenzie got on her gown and socks and a hat. They had the anesthesiologist and surgeon come in to talk to us and tell us what to expect. The surgeon said he was going to try to set it without doing surgery if he could. They also had a really nice lady come in to talk to Kenzie about it all. I think her badge said she's a health coach. Kenzie told her she was worried about waking up during the procedure and the lady reassured her that that wasn't going to happen and that the anesthesiologist was the one in charge of the surgery room and her job was to make sure Kenzie didn't feel anything. She told Kenzie she had surprise in her pocket. She asked Kenzie if she wanted to see what it was. Kenzie said "sure" in a small sweet voice. It was a squishy ball. She asked Kenzie if she wanted it and Kenzie replied with the same "sure.' It was really cute.

They gave her an iPad to play with for a few minutes before the surgery. They started the medicine in this room and then wheeled her away. I waited in the waiting room until she was done. The surgery seemed to take about an hour and a half. The surgeon came out to talk to me when it was done. He said it went well. He did have to perform surgery and he used wires to help hold the bone in place and they'd need to be removed in 4-6 weeks. I kept waiting for them to come get me once she woke up but they didn't come for another hour, around 1. She was still sound asleep, but they let me come sit with her. I kept telling her we could go home after she woke up but she didn't wake for another 40 minutes. When she did she sat up looked around and said "did they fix me?" I said yep and she sat back and smiled. She was so happy that it was over. She kept smiling and sighing contentedly. The nurse gave her some apple juice and after a sip she sighed.

An actual happy smile. She was happy to get a popsicle. Right before she woke up Doug said he wanted to come. In the morning they told me she had to stay for 45 minutes after she woke up, but once she woke up and had some apple juice and a popsicle, the nurse said she could go. So as soon as Doug showed up we were getting her ready to leave. The nurse unhooked her from everything and I helped her get dressed. Doug picked up her medication at the hospital pharmacy. She rode in a wheel chair down to entrance. I picked up the car and we drove home. We were both super tired and so happy to finally be done with ERs and hospitals!