Don't walk on the wall

I've said it a hundred times at least. Kids are naturally attracted to pretending to walk a balance beam on curbs and planting walls. For the life of me I will never understand why the elementary schools around here have these walls and why they are so high.

Last week at Girl Scouts Ava was walking to the bathroom and decided to balance on the wall that leads down a path. The wall gradually ascends higher and higher as the sidewalk slopes away. She fell off the wall and landed on her stomach, knocking the wind out of herself.

Yesterday, were at basketball practice for Sophia. Ava was wearing her patch and glasses because we're supposed to patch 3 hours a day, but we're never home. She was sitting on a high wall that was a planting wall. It separated the lunch area from the basketball court and was a planting bed as well. She was drinking water and talking to me. I told her not to walk on the wall. She might fall. This wall was about 4 foot tall. And, I reminded her that with her patch on she has poor depth perception.

She stood up and it appeared that she was going to walk over to the stairs to come down. I turned back to watch practice. 30 seconds later I hear a scream, that only momentarily registered as sounding like Ava. I saw another mom closer to the scream turn and look and start walking towards the steps. I realized that it was Ava and now her scream was loud and mixed with crying. I raced around the corner and found her lying there on the ground at the base of the wall near the steps.

It looked as if she had broken her arm, she was laying on her side and holding her elbow screaming that it hurt. I scooped her up and turned her into my lap. Her elbow was swollen and had an abrasion. She said her leg hurt and I inspected that, a few scratches but fine. The other mom asked her if she tripped and fell on the stairs and she said "yes". I asked if if she actually was on the wall and fell off the wall and she admitted that yes, she was on the wall even after I had told her not to be.

Now, I'm concerned about her head. Did you hit your head? She said yes, right in the middle of her forehead. I asked if it hurt and she said it hurt on the sides by the ears.

After she calmed down I asked her again about her head and she said she was dizzy and her eyes were blurry. Now, she just recently started wearing glasses so I wasn't sure what to do about her saying that.

I called my friend Dee Dee for some motherly advice. At this moment Isabella comes racing over with a giant wad of gum stuck in her hair (really, geez, one crisis at a time, take a number).

After hours of debate I decided to just watch Ava for additional symptoms and monitor her closely through the night (we all know the ER here stinks...anyone remember when Ava was dehydrated and what a nightmare that was). She started complaining of a tummy ache last night.

This morning she woke up crying that her head still hurt and she felt nauseous. She ate a banana and then ran to the toilet like she was going to vomit. She gagged but nothing came up. She seemed more sluggish and foggy than she normally is in the mornings.

I decided to keep her home from school and take her to the doctor. Turns out she has a concussion. a bruise to the brain. She's not able to play any sports for 3 weeks and if she throws up anytime in the next 2 weeks we're supposed to take her to the ER.

She says she still has a headache, but she's rested alot today and she wants to know when her brain will forgive her.