Nose Job

I woke up bleary eyed and confused to discover the phone that had been ringing in my dream was actually ringing in real life. I stumbled through the dark kitchen and attempted to pick it up.

The caller was apparently my son, Mr 16. I glanced at the clock, it was 1:30am which in my daze, confused me even further until I suddenly remembered he wasn’t in his bedroom 5 metres away but sleeping over at a mates farm.

He said something along the lines of “Ivegodda go tothehozpitalll, the dog bit me in muh fashe real bad” in a very slurry tone.

Trying to comprehend his obviously intoxicated English was tricky in my half awake state but I suddenly cottoned on to what he’d actually said and shook myself awake.

His friends Dad was apologising profusely, the boys had apparently “had a few beers” and been playing with the dog but the dog had suddenly snapped Mr16 right on the nose/mouth. We decided to meet up with his mates Dad at a turn off near the little village we lived in so I could take him to the hospital.

I wasn’t sure what I would be met by and when they arrived Mr16 lifted the blood stained tea towel off his face and I could see the bottom of his right nostril had been severed and was only just hanging on by by a tiny piece of flesh, his top lip was badly swollen and there was a chunk missing in the corner of his lower lip.

Oh crap, his poor face, this was going to need surgery.

The more local hospital wouldn’t be able to deal with this so we drove the hour and a half into the city hospital. I drive that distance several days a week but it seems really quick as usually I zone out for 90% of it, boy that drive takes a looong time in the wee hours of the morning when you need a hospital and are trying to keep your wits about you because it’s a full moon and there are Kangaroos and Wombats everywhere.

We eventually got there and Mr16 was in remarkably good spirits considering and claimed he had no pain, no doubt due to the quantity of actual spirits he’d been drinking that night. They took one look and rushed him straight through, a lovely young doctor started antibiotics & cleaned the wound as best she could while he made loud obnoxious drunk teenager type jokes.

We waited until morning for the plastics team to come and review him and they said they’d take him to surgery and give it a really good clean. As infection is the biggest risk with dog bites, they said after cleaning they might have to wait a day or so to try and reattach the front of his nostril.

He was taken to pre op and put on nil by mouth to wait for an available theatre. Unfortunately was a long wait that ended at about 4pm with the nurse bringing a sandwich and apologising that he’d been bumped off the list until tomorrow.

Due to the long weekend, beautiful weather and no doubt the full moon, the pre op area was full to the brim of people needing grafts and bones pinned. Plus a nurse pointed out it’s 9 months since Christmas so babies were suddenly being born all over the place – and babies didn’t wait for convenient times, so emergency C sections were taking up a lot of theatre space!

I wasn’t allowed to sleep in a chair on the ward so I ended up going home so I could pick up some things for him. He was feeling much more somber when I arrived this morning, I think the gravity of the potentially permanent damage to his face had set in and Hubby and I have told him if worst case scenario they can’t fix it properly now, we will find a plastic surgeon privately who can give him a nose job. (Thank Goodness I have life insurance!!)

So right now we are playing the waiting game again, he’s apparently 4th on the surgery list and should go in late this morning barring any unexpected emergencies. As I type this he is watching Netflix on his phone (grateful for technology) and I’m obviously on my phone, aww I can hear another new born baby crying, at least there are some happy things going on here today! I’ll let you all know how it goes.

xx Kate