Lucas's Broken Arm

Eating a sucker with his splint

Watching a movie while they put on his cast.

Wearing his sling and ready to go home

Asleep after a long day

This week we experienced a first in the Rudolph Family. Lucas broke both bones in the middle of his left forearm, which makes him the first of the four of us to have a broken bone. He was playing at school with his friends on the playground, and he fell off and hit is arm on his way down. His teachers called us and unfortunately we were both about as far away from his school as we can get and still be in Evansville. Andy headed after him and I started making some phone calls to figure out where we should take him.

When Andy got to school, he found the preschool teacher, the Pre-K teacher, and the principal all huddled around Lucas with pillows and ice, just trying to make him comfortable. The principal rode in the backseat of the truck to the urgent care center in order to keep Lucas company. What principal of a preschool through 8th grade school, leaves during the middle of the day to ride to the clinic with a preschooler with a broken arm??? A totally awesome one!! Not that we ever doubted it, but this just proved to me once again that we have Lucas in an amazing school filled with people who take the best care of him while he is there.

I got to the care center first and tried to figure out what our options were going to be since our insurance just expired 2 days prior and my new insurance doesn't kick until mid-April. Yep, that's right we have no insurance for 21 days and the boy breaks his arm :) When Andy carried Lucas in he looked pitiful and every time Andy moved him just a little bit he screamed. Every time the nurse came out to call someone back, he screamed. Then we got out his lunch and gave him the iPhone to play with his good hand and he started to calm down a bit. He screamed all the way back when they finally did get to us and he didn't want anyone to touch him.

He got X-rays that confirmed the break, a prescription for Tylenol 3 and they wrapped his arm up in a splint. The doctor brought him a dum-dum sucker and explained that studies show the sugar is a more effective pain killer than morphine in young children. Amazingly enough the sucker either distracted him or eased his pain, because Lucas did calm down again.

We then headed to Orthopedic Associates to get a cast. We of course got the prescription filled on the way to try to get Lucas some relief from the pain. We waited for an hour and half and the medicine kicked in. Lucas became the hit of the waiting room, and with all the nurses. He watched a movie on the iPad during the casting process and then was a happy boy. He finally fell asleep on the way home after his 6 hour ordeal.

At first he was pretty frustrated with all the things he couldn't do with his cast on, but now he is using his cast and there's not much he isn't doing on his own. He was a trooper and we are very proud of how he handled the whole thing.

Here's a few funny/sweet things he did. He has been watching a Curious George episode where George breaks his leg and gets x-rays and a cast. George has to be in a wheel chair. So at the doctor's office Lucas asked if he was going to have to get a wheel chair too? When he was still in a lot of pain and very upset, he told me he needed his best friend there. I asked who that was and he responded, "My brother Adam!". It's great how much those two love each other. Lucas asked for Adam to make him feel better several times throughout the day and then Adam brought Lucas (courtesy of Grandma Kay), a box of peeps and three balloons. Lucas perked up immediately. Brothers are the best!