Don't worry...Your husband is in the ER, but he's ok....

Yesterday was the youth temple trip and Young Women broadcast, so it was a busy day for me. I woke up with a migraine, so I layed on the couch and Greg rubbed my head until the last minute to ease my headache, and then I got ready to go in 30 minutes and took off to the church. Once we got to the church I realized I had forgotten my phone in my rush to be ready in time, but it was too late and I couldn't think of a good reason I would need it anyway.

We met at the church at 11am and carpooled to the temple in Spokane. Then we walked over to the park where some of the leaders had made sack lunches for us. The girls got to grab their sack lunch first and then hopped in cars and took off. (The boys stayed and ate their lunches at the park since they weren't in a hurry.) We had two hours exactly to get back to Moscow, which was about two hours away. The trip went well and I had a lot of fun talking with my friend, Tara, who was driving.

We got to the church in Moscow just in time for the opening song and prayer. It was a really nice program with speakers and the choir. After the broadcast we headed over to the mall for a quick stop on the way home. Tara and I were still talking and having a wonderful time. When we pulled into our parking spot we just sat for a second, laughing and talking before we got out of the car. Then I saw Cindy appear out the side window of my friend's car. She had followed us to the temple and back because she didn't know the way, but we were surprised that she followed us to the mall too. Everybody was supposed to go home now.

Tara rolled down her window and Cindy said, "Holly, don't worry, but your husband is in the ER. He's ok, and he said he knew you would freak out, but you didn't have your phone so he could tell you. He cut his hand and needs stitches." So, telling me not to worry really has the opposite effect, because then I started imagining all sorts of things. Greg often works in the machine shop alone, cutting metal and who knows what. I don't like him being alone there, but I always know when he's going so I can check on him if I get worried.

Tara still had to go to the mall, so I hopped in Cindy's car so she could take me to the hospital. She had a couple girls (12 yr olds) in her car still, and when they heard about Greg being hurt they started talking excitedly about all the ways you could hurt yourself. "Yeah, and you could step on a nail and it would go through your foot! That would hurt!" "What if you stepped on a toothpick?" "What if..." I was going nuts with worry about Greg and just wanted to get there.

Finally we arrived, and as we pulled up I could see Greg through the window. He was in the waiting room looking very sober. I ran over to sit with him and he said he was ok. Then he showed me his finger and I started to cry again. He had been washing the dishes, when a drinking glass broke. He was just sticking his hand in the glass, but since it broke at the same time, it sliced a big flap in his pointer finger. It looked really awful and I was so sad to see his hand hurt like that. He had been waiting in the waiting room since 5:30pm, and by that time it was about 7pm. He was feeling dizzy and light-headed, partially from his hurt hand and partially because he was starving. He hadn't had dinner yet and didn't realize he was going to be sitting for hours in the waiting room. Luckily I had some food left in a lunch I had packed for the trip, so I let him eat my sandwich.

They finally called us back and a CNA came in and cleaned his finger. I thought it must hurt a lot, but Greg is pretty good at dealing with pain. The CNA was a really nice guy and he was careful and gentle. We waited awhile longer and then a nurse came in and said, "Ready for your Tetanus shot?" in a bright happy voice. You might have thought she was offering him some ice cream.

We waited longer, and every once in awhile somebody would bustle in and back out of the room, reassuring us that the doctor was on his way. There was only one doctor, and one CNA. I don't know how many nurses they had. It was fairly busy though. We could see out the window that things were hopping. I was feeling so nervous and sick for Greg with every thing that they had to do to him. When the doctor finally came in I felt even more nervous. He was friendly and made conversation while he stuck the needle in Greg's finger to numb it. He put it in several place pointing it in all different directions. Finally Greg said he couldn't feel it anymore and I could relax a little. Then the doctor started stitching him up. I wanted to watch because I was curious about how it was done, but I didn't think it was a good idea because I had felt so light-headed when I watched them clean the wound earlier. Greg got 10 stitches, and then they put the fat gauze wrap on his finger. It kept his finger mostly straight, but it's not as rigid and annoying as having a metal splint.

We got home at 9:30pm, tired and worn out. His hand was starting to hurt and feel weird--I think because it was regaining feeling, so we watched a movie to distract him from his hand. I was surprised to realize that they never offered or gave him any kind of pain medication. Is that normal? Aren't you supposed to get something to help it feel better when you slice your hand open?

So that's the story. I don't have any pictures right now, but maybe I'll post a picture later when he takes off the bandages. We trying to think of a better story than "Washing Dishes" because that's kind of lame. He told one of the nurses that he got in a knife fight. Haha, she looked very surprised and worried, but then he told her quickly what really happened before she could start making notes about the knife fight. I'm sure they do get knife fight wounds to take care of every once in awhile.

When the doctor was working on Greg's hand, he started to notice all the other scars he has on both hands and asked how he got them all. Greg concluded that if he didn't get a serious cut at least once a summer, he didn't have enough fun.