This week, for the first time ever, I called 999.
My son, a two year old toddler, innocently fell over in his baby brother’s room (whether said little brother deliberately stuck his leg out is a subject to be discussed on another day), but careered head first into the side of a toy box with such force that he quite literally split his head open.
He obviously screamed at a pitch and volume that I have never heard before (and never wish to hear again!), and when I turned him round to cuddle him his face was already covered in blood. My initial internal reaction of absolute panic was taken over by the need to comfort and reassure him, but having got a flannel to his head to stem the bleeding I realised the wound was about the same size as his open eye, and oh, so deep. I’m not squeamish, but even I wanted to vomit (all I can say is thank goodness my husband wasn’t there – he nearly passed out when I had a drip put in my hand once).
I rang a good friend. “I need help” I said. Correction: “I need help” I wailed “A has his cut his head.” “I’ll come and get the baby” she said.
I looked at his head again, I thought for the briefest of moments, and without hesitation dialled 999. They were brilliant on the phone (although even they laughed when they asked if the crying they could hear was the patient and I answered that no, that was my baby, who cries if his big brother does, and yes, I did have two screaming infants with me, one of them bleeding profusely). They told me to keep him still, try and apply pressure to the wound, keep him calm, ring back if he deteriorated before the ambulance crew arrived and open the front door (on a complete aside, I’ve never known about this ‘leave the front door open’ policy, but it makes so much sense on a number of levels 1) if you’re the patient in case you pass out before they get there 2) if you’re tending to the patient it could take time to answer the door and 3) the ambulance doesn’t have to slowly crawl down a street while the crew look for door numbers or names, they just look for the open door. Clever.)
Somehow my friend, with her one year old son in tow, beat the ambulance to my house. Which was impressive because the ambulance was fast! She took the baby and the ambulance crew took me and the wounded little soldier. He clung on to me for dear life in the “nee-nar” despite my efforts at trying to console him with stories of how jealous all his friends would be that he’d been driven in one. It may be the best cuddle he has ever given me. How’s that for finding a silver lining?!
The paramedics reassured me and looked after him physically and mentally - they even tried to make him smile with a puppet they made by blowing up a surgical glove and drawing a face on it. They got us to hospital pronto where the doctors and nurses fixed him up (the fact we had to return three times before someone glued and stitched his head sufficiently to stop the bleeding and seal the wound is another story, one that spans 72 hours and that is similarly harrowing and gory).
All details aside though, I guess the point to my little tale is that I’ve always worried that when the time came I wouldn’t know when something was serious enough to dial the emergency services, and like so many other people wouldn’t want to “cause a fuss”. Thankfully when the time is right to panic, you do!
