A Tale of Two (or a few) Head Injuries

Ruby is BY FAR my most accident prone child. I think it's a combination of her trying to always keep up with her two older siblings (thinking she is big enough to do what they do), a clumsy age anyway, and then you add hard tile floors to the mix. It's a recipe for disaster for any child, I guess. She has fallen and hurt her head too many times to count but I took pictures of the worst two.

This one happened when she was sitting on a chair at the desk in my room and fell off. As she fell her head hit the corner of the chair then she landed on her head on the hard tile. Poor thing... 

This next one was BY FAR the worst injury ANY of my kids have ever had! I can usually remain calm in personal injury situations. I know that if I freak out my kids will follow my example. With this circumstance I couldn't help myself... I went into full freak out mode. I was in the laundry room hanging up laundry, the kids were all playing and I had noticed that they were in the hall at the top of the stairs (just four stairs, but EVERYTHING is tile), when I heard a CRASH! I went running!! I saw Ruby was in the umbrella stroller, face down with the stroller on top of her at the bottom of the stairs. I pulled the stroller off of her and she was strapped in. I frantically unbuckled her and watched the BIGGEST goose egg appear before my eyes! It was instantaneous and I kept thinking it was going to burst open and blood would come pouring out! (Common sense doesn't exist in my mind during bad circumstances apparently.)
 I felt TERRIFIED, but let me explain why. Of course we are in Grenada, which is not considered a first world nation. So the medical capabilities on the island are... not what I'm used to. The ambulances (which I have only seen two) look like they are straight out of the Ghost-busters movie from 1984... well they are like this:

     

Yes, this is an actual ambulance and let's just say that in emergency situations nobody ever calls them. It's a known fact that if a person gets hit by a car, the person who hit them picks them up and drives them to the hospital themselves. Then there are the hospitals themselves, which I have never actually been to, but some of my friends had their babies in the PRIVATE hospitals and say they are like a hospital in the States would be... in the 1970's... so a little behind the times. Needless to say one of our current sayings we use with the kids is "don't get hurt in Grenada!" 

So here I am watching my daughters head swell up right in front of me and I start crying out, "OH MY GOSH! OH MY GOSH!" over and over again! I must have had a look of terror on my face because Cannon immediately almost started crying and started asking. "What is it Mom?! What is it?!" I knew I couldn't call Josh so I ran next door remembering that I had seen Tim out a little earlier. (He is a med student as well, but a year ahead of Josh.) I left Cannon and Hazyl, took Ruby with me, and ran to Tim's door. He answered and immediately knew why I was there. We were trying to see if her pupils were dilated when Ruby, who had been screaming bloody murder up to this point, suddenly stopped crying and laid her head on my shoulder. I then started freaking out that she was beginning to act lethargic. Tim and Laina offered to watch Cannon and Hazyl so I could run Ruby to the clinic on SGU campus. 

I ran back inside our place to tell Cannon and Hazyl that I would be leaving when I found Cannon had shut himself in his room. The fall had been his doing and I knew he felt SO bad. So I had to calmly explain to him that I was NOT mad at him, I knew he didn't mean to hurt Ruby, but I needed to make sure Ruby was ok and he needed to tell me what had happened. He came out and told me that he had helped buckle Ruby in the stroller all by himself and that he was so excited he wanted to show me. So he tried to push the stroller down the stairs and it got too heavy with Ruby in it and it slipped out of his hands. So she rocketed forward and because she was strapped in, couldn't catch herself as her head smashed against the tile floor. My heart ached for Cannon and I gave him a big hug and reassured him that I was not mad at him but needed to take Ruby to the doctor. 

I put Ruby in the car and started the drive to campus. In my haste I then realized that I didn't know WHERE on campus the clinic was!! Ahh! I then decided I could call Josh and he could tell me. I called him... no answer. I called him again... no answer. I called him AGAIN...no answer. (By this time I am becoming more and more irritated that he doesn't keep his Grenada phone in view for such circumstances. WHY does he NEVER answer?! Ugh!! In stressful circumstances, I'm not a very nice person, I have learned.) By this time I am on campus driving around trying to find the clinic when FINALLY Josh calls me back. I had already asked a student where the clinic was and was walking to it. I told Josh what had happened and he ran to the clinic to come and look at her. I was hoping that at the clinic they would have some type of an x-ray machine to see if her skull was fractured. Josh walked into the clinic as I was waiting to talk to the front desk and he looked at Ruby. Now I know he's only a first term med student and nowhere near being a doctor yet, but I also knew that he has worked over four years in an Emergency Room and has seen his fair share of head injuries. So he would know better than me if Ruby's injury was concerning. By now Ruby was actually not acting lethargic at all, she was back to her normal self. Climbing on the table and chairs in the waiting room and super excited to see Daddy! Josh went and asked if the facility had any type of x-ray machine, which they didn't (TIG) and he said she should be ok with some ice and ibuprofen. So I took her back home and relieved our neighbors of their spontaneous babysitting duties. Poor Ruby will have a bump and bruise for a REALLY long time. I just hope there's no long term effects from her fall. 

The pictures don't really give it justice. These were taken at the clinic.

These were taken later that evening and in the following days.

Side Facts, to my knowledge, about Grenada:
*There is currently no MRI machine on the island. It broke and has not been fixed (for who knows how long).
*There is no NICU on the island. So delivering babies is much more risky here.
*In the private hospital (the nicer one), when you deliver a baby you bring your own bed sheets with you. There are no sheets on the bed.
*It's not uncommon for women waiting for a room in the public hospital, to give birth in the hallways.
*If you have a doctors appointment at an office they do not set up a time. They tell you a day to come and you wait your turn. First come, first serve, by number. So if the clinic opens at 8am, people usually start lining up by 7:30 to have one of the first numbers. But usually if the clinic starts handing out numbers at 8am that means the doctor doesn't actually arrive until 9am. So you're looking at a MINIMUM wait of 1.5 hours. I have a friend who waited 5 hours to see the doctor, and this is not uncommon.

UPDATE: Jan 12, 2016
JUST as Ruby's bump was ALMOST gone, about three nights ago she fell out of bed and hit her head (we think on the nightstand and then the floor) in the EXACT same spot! I'm afraid this girl is going to have a permanent goose egg/bruise on her forehead! Poor thing!