Screw Nose's Anniversary

It's been almost four years since Wesley (who was two at the time) stuffed a screw up his nose which caused a mad rush to the emergency room. I can still remember it clearly.

The kids were down for a nap and I had just dozed off after watching a rerun of Martha Stewart showing me how to maintain my massive orchard of apple trees when a scream pierced the silence. Wesley was in the living room and blood was gushing out of his nose. At first I didn’t panic because he gets nosebleeds from time to time from his allergies. He was crying and in between the snot and the blood I could not make it out. Finally, he said, “A nail crawled up my nose.”

What? Surely he didn’t say, “nail”. Maybe he said snail. After all, I am not the best housekeeper and a snail can crawl, although very slowly. I looked up his nose half expecting to see the shell of a French entree. Sure enough, there was a metal tip more than have way up his nose. So much for pulling out a snail. I hesitated going in after it because there was a chance of real injury—not because of the blood.

Anyway, I made the mistake of asking how long the nail was and Wesley stretched his fingers as far as they could go. Where did this monstrosity come from? As far as I knew, Dave and I were not in the construction or blacksmithing business. Also, how did this nail get into his nose? Wesley kept insisting that it did indeed rudely crawl up his nose. Despite the fact I taught him that certain things were inanimate, he insisted. I stuffed a kitchen towel in his hand and told him to hold it on his nose to stop the blood. He was concerned about hurting the nail.

After the ER nurse stop laughing, they told me Wesley was going to be fine. They tried to get it out with tweezers despite the fact I told them Wesley would not stand for it. I mean, this kid thinks he’s dying when he gets a paper cut. He could win an award for best actor during a melodramatic tantrum. The nurse medicated Wesley. They declined to medicate me although I believed I needed more than Wesley. In the space of ten minutes, my three year old son was stoned.

“Mommy, Oprah’s dress is soooo green.” He laughed as he rolled around the hospital bed.

“Mommy, hold my hand,” he asked as he threw his foot into my hand.

“Mommy, why do you throw your veggies to the dogs but make me eat them?” Oops

This was getting serious. I know a nail up the nose was not considered an emergency but we had to get out of here before the kid told everyone I color my hair and secretly eat at Sonic for breakfast.

After explaining to Wesley why Oprah was giving away cars, the nurse came in and strapped my son to a papoose looking bed. Any other time, Wesley would have screamed like he was forced to eat squash. This time, he giggled. The doctor opened the door carrying a sinister looking tool designed to pull out railroad spikes. I felt lightheaded just looking at it; Wesley laughed uproariously. This had to be plot of a Mel Brooks movie written by Steven King.

In the space of two seconds, the doctor had pulled out ¼ inch screw. He asked if I wanted to keep it as a memento. I thanked him and asked if I could have the souvenir tee-shirt instead.

Wesley finally admitted that night that the screw did not deliberately go up his nose but he put it up there to see if it would fit. He thought it would not. I almost told him to quit thinking like that. After all, thinking leads to questions; questions lead to touching and touching leads to the Dark Side (or in my case, the emergency room). But I changed my mind—I don’t want my children ever to stop exploring or asking questions. But to be on the safe side, I ran a metal detector through the bedrooms.

Why do I remember this so clearly today you ask? Because I've just pulled an embedded 1/4 inch screw out of my heel after changing Wesley's bed. Screw Nose strikes again.