Flashback: August Anguish

All we heard were blood-curdling screams, Richard and I, coming from the basement. We raced to the top of the stairs and found our boy climbing up with his hands covering his face, and blood covering everything else. He had shot (his brother's newly purchased and parentally unknown) air-compressed BB pistol. The metal pellet rebounded off an exposed stud and landed deep inside his face. That night was full of two trips to the local ER, one trip to Primary Children's ER, and, a few days later, a visit to the plastic surgeon.

A few hours after the initial stitches, so the pain was tolerable. The swelling and brusing has begun, but would get bigger and darker before it got better a couple of weeks later.

Waiting for a surgical consult at Primary's. Cooper was a trooper, despite the pain and emotional trauma.

The culprit caught on film. A perfect circle that, at this point, remains inside my little boy's face. It narrowly missed the important nerves and muscle. According to the doctor, "if there's a perfect place he could have shot himself, he found it." A miracle.

We have decided, for now anyway, to follow the plastic surgeon's recommendation that we leave the BB there unless it causes a complication. It is deep enough to require general anesthesia and removal from the inside of the mouth. It is deep enough that it can't be felt or seen from the surface and, so, not worth the risk of putting him under. You can bet I asked the surgeon if that's the choice he would make if it were his own son we were talking about!