The Nose Knows

Peter and Jill had their first visits to their preschool classrooms today. Jill jumped back into her routine in the Yellow Room without missing a beat. However, Ms. Pearson had rearranged the classroom a little bit. When Jill finally came across her favorite work, the punching work (she pokes tiny holes along the edge of a picture with a tack to improve her writing grip), she said, "Aha! The punching work! Ms. Pearson moved it! That Ms. Pearson is tricky!"

Flashback to Monday, Peter, on the other hand, started his preschool career by refusing his back-to-school haircut. He thrashed in my lap while the woman cutting his hair worked hard to make him presentable. By the end of the ordeal, I had been squirted in the face several times and both Peter and I were covered in hair adhered to our skin with lollipop drool (the lollipop was an ineffective bribe).

Peter has gotten the memo about the terrible twos. Or maybe I have neglected to discipline my baby because he is just so cute? Could that be? Anyway...

Back to this morning... As we walked to school, Peter yelled from his stroller, "I don't want Miss Deborah! Miss Deborah is yucky!" Oh boy. By the way, Miss Deborah is lovely! When we got there, he repeatedly tried to make a break for the door. I intended to let him walk into his class like a big boy, but eventually, to prevent his escape, I had to sort of lead/drag/carry him into the room.

When Peter finally settled down and got to work, the concentration on his baby face was adorable. He worked hard for about 30 minutes exploring the classroom and, when it was time to go, yelled cheerfully, "Bye Miss Deborah! See you later!"

So things were looking up until Peter shoved a chopped walnut in his right nostril tonight. He was seated in his high chair eating and all of a sudden started screaming. He pointed to his nose and said through wails, "My nose! My nose!" I grabbed a tissue and said, "Peter can you blow it out?" Instead, he sucked it in deeper. And yelled louder.

While I was waiting for the pediatrician to call me back, I scooped him up and put him in his carseat so we could start driving to the hospital. He was hysterical (and I was getting there), so I called to Jill, "Put your shoes on and come to the car." A minute later Jill came out, shutting the door behind her. She said, "I couldn't find my socks, so I just put my sneakers on without them." I said, "That was a good decision, honey." I'm glad someone was cool under pressure!

By the time the pediatrician called me, Peter had calmed down. I said, "Is that nut still in your nose?" He cheerfully told me it wasn't. So I explained to the nurse that I thought it was either very deep in his nose or had dropped down his throat. She got me an appointment at the after hours clinic at Lawrence General, so we headed there, with Jill lecturing Peter the whole way. She was really letting him have it. "You NEVER put anything in your nose, Peter! There should be nothing in your nose but boogers!"

I checked in at reception desk, "Hi, this is Peter Cavener--" The woman shook her head and said, "Oooooh, Peter Cavener," there was an implied tsk tsk, like, what have you done? That made me laugh.

Bryan arrived just before the doctor came into examine Peter. The nurses and doctors were phenomenal. They had Jill demonstrate for Peter everything they were going to do. Eventually Bryan had to hold Peter down so that his nose could be thoroughly examined (Jill and I left for that), but Peter got over that pretty quickly too.

The doctors said they didn't see the nut in his nose, and couldn't hear anything in his lungs--this is a third place the nut could have ended up, thank God that didn't occur to me! So he was discharged with a sticker and a small list of signs I should watch for in case the nut was still in his nose.

AND THIS PART IS IMPORTANT: they said that should this happen again (really?), I should flatten the clear nostril with my finger and blow a burst of air into Peter's mouth. That can help rocket the object out. If I had known this, I could have had that nut out in an instant. Don't let it be said that Cavener News isn't informative!