The Story of Harlee's Broken Arm (And My Natural Remedy Approach)

So, as I mentioned in my last post, Harlee broke his arm.

Let me tell you that story, shall I?

Harlee's always been a climber - I can't even remember how long he's been climbing - but making his way up on top of the counter has turned into a daily occurrence.  I'll be honest, I really don't mind him sitting up against the wall while I cook - he's been so fascinated in cooking lately and I love that he wants to participate.  I encourage his desire to get involved - let him stir, crack eggs, pour, add ingredients, etc - and he loves to help.  That counter isn't so bad, too - there's only one direction to fall off, and I'm right there.  This time, however, he was up on our peninsula counter top.  There are three directions to fall off of that one, and of course he chose the opposite side I was standing on.  He was "fishing".  It was cute listening to him announce, "Fishing, Mom!" or "Look, Mom, big one!!" and dangle my tape measure over the side waiting for a nibble.  Then the tape measure fell, and he reached to try to catch it, and instead down he went with it... head-first, disappearing over the edge out of my sight.

My heart stopped, and I immediately thought the worst: "Oh my god he broke his neck."

Broken elbow - you can clearly see the break!

Thank goodness he tried to break his fall with his arm instead, leaving the rest of him perfectly intact, but I knew by the looks of his arm just dangling there, unmoving, that we had a problem.  Justin had come running when he heard both of us scream, and I immediately told him to start packing things up, we're going to the ER, NOW.  And so began our long adventure of getting our deep sea fisherman put back together.  X-rays at Red Bud Regional confirmed that he broke his arm in three places - a simple break on both the radius and ulna that could have easily been braced, but a huge fracture at the humerus that would definitely need pins to put it back in place.  The good thing about it is that he missed the growth plate, which could have caused a lot more problems in the long run.  Next came an ambulance ride up to Children's Hospital (which Harlee actually thought was pretty cool), and a loooong long wait in a small room with lots of meetings with surgeons, doctors, nurses, and people wanting to see his arm and pissing him off.  He got hooked up to an IV, and by 2am and we had a room ready, so we moved and tried to sleep.  We hoped an opening for surgery would be available in the morning, but no such luck - we had to wait until 1:30 in the afternoon to send him in, all the while trying to keep him comfortable and entertained with books and cartoons (and his mind off of eating or drinking since he couldn't before surgery).  Then came the hardest part of letting them take him away to anesthesia, crying, and then waiting waiting waiting to get the call that he was put back in place and wrapped up in a cast.  The surgery took about 30 minutes, all together the process was about 2 hours.  Back to the room we went and waited for him to wake up, then waited for discharge papers.  By 6:30 we were out of there and headed home, WHEW.

Here's the bend in his radius and ulna

Laying with Dad waiting for surgery

Pins in place to hold his elbow together

This is a week later - radius and ulna all healed!

Sleeping off the anesthesia

He enjoyed coloring on his cast

One of the reasons I wanted to tell this story is to relay to you my natural approach to handling the aftermath of all this.  Hospitals are dirty places where it's very easy to pick anything up, especially this time of year, so immediately I was concerned for his immune system.  Added to the fact that he'd been introduced to more drugs in one day than he had his entire two and a half years of life, and I was certain his immune system would need a little encouragement.  I started in on the homeopathics right away, administering Arnica 200C every half hour for about 6 hours, and by the second dose his fingers were moving like normal again.  That stuff never ceases to amaze me.  We had gotten this dosage from Harlee's pediatrician (a group that practices both Western/conventional medicine as well as natural medicine, I can't begin to express how fortunate/blessed/happy I am to have an option for healthcare like this so close to home) back when he hurt his leg when he was just learning to walk.  The way he cried when trying to move, or during diaper changes, or anytime we even touched it, led us to believe there was something going on with it that needed to be looked into.  That was his first trip to the ER and his first experience with X-rays.  Fortunately there was no break, but the doctors assumed it had been sprained.  We got him in to his pediatrician to check him out, since he was clearly still in pain and anytime he pulled himself up on furniture and tried to cruise he'd limp.  He almost had a limp while he crawled, too.  They prescribed Arnica, which I figured they would, but in a much higher dose than you can find at health food stores (which I keep on hand for sore muscles or bruises) - thus the 200C.  By the second dose the limp was GONE.  I'm not exaggerating.  He crawled and cruised again like nothing ever happened.  Amazing.  Plus, no harmful side effects - I'll take it!  So back to the current story with the broken arm, like I said, again after the second dose his fingers were moving and gripping like nothing ever happened.  Of course there were conventional drugs involved, though, as they certainly have their place.  He had been prescribed ibuprofen for pain and to help keep inflammation down, but giving it to him was a chore... He does not take kindly to that kind of medicine, but we were supposed to give it to him every 6 hours.  Well, we ended up just giving it to him upon request, which would sometimes turn into 8+ hours.  If he was hurting bad enough, he willingly took it when we explained it would help him feel better.  It would have been easier to give it to him to avoid the pain in the first place, but we couldn't quite explain that to him.  Oh well, I'm glad he didn't have to have TOO many drugs in him after all.  And I guess the Arnica was helping quite a bit with pain, too.

He always requested the "crunchy" medicine!

To help counteract all the drugs he's had in his system over the past couple days, I pumped up the probiotics.  Normally I would break open a capsule and pour half of the contents into his juice or almond milk, but this time I dumped a whole two capsules in it.  I also added a liquid multi-vitamin to his juice, and regularly applied Young Living's Thieves essential oil blend to the bottoms of his feet.  His health has remained in great shape - no mystery illnesses contracted from the hospital and no immune system compromise from what I could tell.

Another helpful remedy was also brought to my attention by a good friend of mine who's also knowledgeable on healing alternatives.  It's called Traumeel, and it comes in either a cream or tablets.  It's homeopathic and contains a combination of several different remedies for healing and recovery as well as muscle and joint pain relief.  It worked great in place of ibuprofen or Tylenol anytime he complained of pain, and I was happy to give him a tablet of that anytime he needed it rather than the ibuprofen or Tylenol, as there are no side effects and it's totally safe.  Can't go wrong with that!

Today marks three weeks since Harlee had the pins put in place in his elbow, and we just got back a little while ago from Children's Hospital to have the cast taken off and the pins removed.  He's free!  And we're all relieved - no more struggling to get dressed, crying through bath time, or waking up in the middle of the night due to discomfort.  He did great - wasn't scared of the cast saw even though it was really loud, and sat very still while they pulled the pins out.  That was really weird - he didn't need to be numbed or anything - the doc just took some pliers to the pins and slid them right out like nothing, and Harlee didn't even flinch.  He's still wearing the bandage they gave him right now, but once we change it I'll be applying some lavender essential oil to a bandaid (I just bought him some with a Cars theme today) and covering the holes with that.  Lavender is great for warding off infection and speeding up the healing process, and it's nice because it doesn't burn or sting or cause any discomfort.  I always keep it in Harlee's bag because it's an awesome alternative to Neosporin and can also work as a great bug repellent, or if you do happen to get bit it helps take the itch out of it.  It's a very versatile remedy!

So that's our story - hopefully Harlee doesn't have any plans of going fishing off of any high places anymore!

Have to show off his tattoos before they're gone

A before shot

Getting x-rays to make sure everything healed right

And after!  Getting used to using his arm again