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My daughter's cherry accident

[color=Blue][size=4]My daughter's cherry accident[/size][/color]


Having a child is the most wonderful, most daunting, and the most expensive experience one can have. My daughter is now 4 years old, and I’m still trying to keep up with her, whether it’s her jumpy train of thoughts, reckless behaviors, or simple giggling.

Last weekend, I bought a whole bunch of red cherries for my daughter, it’s her favorite snack food, and the local supermarket always got fresh ones. Since I was cooking, I told her to sit with me in the kitchen, and gave her 10 cherries, after a while, she told me “ Dad, I’m all finished” I looked back to her, and was surprised to see there’s no cherry pits on the table. At first, I thought that she had already throw it out in the garbage can, but then I didn’t hear the can being opened.  I asked her:” baby, where did you put the pits?” Her response was the one I didn’t expect at all “ I swallowed them all” I thought she was just joking, but then I looked at her face, well, she’s smiling, but it’s not the smile of putting one joke over me, but the embarrassed smile of she knew she did something wrong. I had a sinking feeling right then, and I asked” Did you swallow them all” She just nodded. I was shocked, this is not the first time she had cherries, heck, it’s not even her 20th or 30th time,  she had always spit out the pits, I was really in a panic then, you know, these are cherry pits, they are quite big, I don’t think I can swallow them without difficulties, but here she is, telling me she swallowed 10 pits without making a sound, and apparently no discomfort at all. I know I can’t make her throw it up, but will they make her sick in the stomach? I read somewhere the cherry pits is toxic. I throw down the spatula, and called her pediatrician right away, but of course it’s Sunday, and the doctor isn’t working. I had no choice but to call the emergency hotline. The dispatcher on the line was calm, and assured me that the ambulance is on the way. I stayed on the line, and cradled my daughter in my arms, watching for any signs of discomfort. Very soon, the ambulance arrived, and the attending doctor arrived with them. I explained the situation, and the doctor told me that they have to take my daughter to the hospital for exam, but he told me this should be no big deal, and gave me an example that kids who swallowed 20 quarters have no problem whatsoever, but this being my own blood and flesh, I won’t take any chance,  and followed the ambulance to the hospital, by this time, my wife was in total panic, and she kept blaming me for not watching our daughter, I just kept telling her everything’s going to be fine, while in my heart, I was blaming myself for forgetting telling my daughter to spit out the pits. After two hours, the pediatrician released my daughter, and again assured me that there’s nothing wrong, there’s no stomach cramps, and no vomiting, she gave me an advice, telling me to get some cranberry juice, and give it to my daughter every 3 hours, because that will help her digestive systems work harder.  I told her that I read somewhere that cherry pits are toxic, she looked at me, and said” Yes, they are, but not in this quantity, she will be fine, and she’ll probably poop them out tomorrow or the day after, don’t worry”. I drove straight to the supermarket and bought 2 bottles of cranberry juices, and gave them to my daughter every three hours. By that time, it’s almost 9 in the evening, and there’s no chance of me finish my cooking, so we ordered pizza, which is my daughter’s favorite food (Her stomach is fully Americanized, despite us feeding her Chinese food every chance we have), she was thrilled with that, and very seriously, she asked me” Dad, do we order pizza every time I swallow cherry pits?” I was aghast, and can’t keep from laughing out loud at her train of thinking. She thinks the whole thing was fun, and wants to do it again. I stopped laughing, and chaste her” Don’t ever do that again, you’re 4 years old, a big girl now, you should know better than to swallow all these pits” She looked at me, and promised never to do that again. Sure enough, after two days, she did poop all these pits out, at least I hope she pooped out every one of them.

I guess the morale of the story is being a parent is hard, despite the age, or how big you think you kid have grown, there’s always mischief lurking, you simply can’t safe guard your kid 100%, the best thing to do is not to panic, and always keep your pediatrician’s phone number handy, or in my case, the local hospitals, and stay off the internet for medical advices.。

[[i] 本帖最后由 lihu8888 于 2011-8-12 08:55 编辑 [/i]]

Having a child and taking care of them growing better is hard but happiness。

Will carries the responsibility for the entire life and this is what we are -- Parent.
Sometimes, the incident was just happen without any signs, unpredictable and sudden.
Just be calm and figure out the prompt action should be taken at that moment, instead of panic and do nothing :excellence

Glad that your daughter have such a good father ~

I found dozen of people who are really versatile in our BBS.
The people who can write so beautiful a chaper is really a good father for his daughter.
The essay is filled with mothion and deep love of his daugher who is really smart and lucky.
Good essay and good father!