Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Toddler Milestone: Food Up The Nose

Sometimes, life hands you lemons, and you just have to make lemonade.  As of lunchtime today, I had no idea what I was going to write about.  Nothing really crazy has happened for a few days, and nothing is new on the dadvertising front - except a funny rant about Lysol Healthy Families from 8BitDad.  But I didn't want to write about that particular topic today.  I wanted to write something about my daughter.  We are busy getting ready for her birthday party this weekend, but otherwise, we are sort of on cruise control as a family.  We have a good routine, and we have been able to enjoy the nice weather recently.  So, unless something crazy or funny happens, I seem to find myself reaching when it comes to blog topics.  Today's lunchtime created an interesting opportunity for me.  My daughter decided to try a different orifice for eating apples, namely, her nose.

There is a point in toddler development when a child believes that it would be fun to put things up their nose.  My daughter hit that milestone today.  Today's lunch was leftover salmon, sugar snap peas, string cheese, and diced apples.  I like my daughter to eat the skin of the apple, so I cut it into small bites about the size of a dime.  This is exactly how they are supposed to be cut according to the anti-choking cheat sheet that is posted on our refrigerator.  The problem is that one slice of apple was diced a little too small, and it was apparently the perfect size to tempt my daughter into lodging it in her left nostril.

I was eating my own lunch when I looked up, and my kid was grinning from ear to ear, "It's in my nose!" she laughed.  As I got up to check out the damage, she fired off three very heavy sneezes in a row.  I touched her nose having no idea what the obstruction actually was (I originally thought it was salmon), and at this point, the crying begins (which I thought was being caused by the mild seasoning on the salmon burning her nostril).  I thought the three sneezes had cleared the obstruction, and she was crying because she was scared or because it burned.  So, we went upstairs to do a double-check, not that kind, and I laid her down on her back in her Boppy Lounger that she now uses as a reading pillow.  With her head over the side and a bright light on, I could see that "it" was a piece of apple, not salmon, and it was still stuck in her nose.

This is when daddy starts to panic.  I didn't want to spend the afternoon in the emergency room.  As I retrieved the tweezers from the bathroom, I couldn't help but think that this would make a funny blog post if it all turns out okay. I sterilized the tweezers with alcohol, and tried to hold my kid still while I scrunched her nose up like a pug and tried to reach for the apple.  She was having no part of it.  I can't blame her.  I didn't exactly have the best tweezers for the job.  We only have the nail maintenance kind.  I would have been better off using a pair of precision needle-nose pliers from my garage.  While I was never able to actually get the tweezers in her nose, let alone touch the apple with the tweezers, whatever I was doing was causing my daughter to have to sneeze again, and she hesitated.  During that split second, I seized the opportunity to have gravity working in our favor, and I stood her up.  When she finally sneezed, the apple was sticking out of the bottom of her nostril just enough that I could grab it with my fingers.

Am I ever glad this story ended happily!  Instead of sitting in the emergency room for several hours during what should be her nap time, my daughter's body recognized that there was a nasal intruder and eliminated it from her system.  The human body really is an amazing thing, and thanks to that cute little toddler human body, I had something to write about today.  Hopefully, this experience was traumatic enough for her that she never does it again.

Did your kids every put anything up their nose?  Did you remove it yourself or end up in the ER?  Share your story so we can all laugh at our collective misfortunes.

10 comments:

  1. I don't have kids, but I find I still sometimes stick food up my nose at nearly 30 years old.

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  2. apparently I did the same with crayons - my mother in her wisdom stuck pepper up my nose to make me sneeze. It didn't work and it was the emergency room for me.

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    1. Nice. Now that I know girls are five times more likely to put things up their nose, I'll be on the lookout.

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  3. Thanks for the shout-out, Matt! For future reference, you can SOMETIMES tell your kid to close their mouth, then use one of those ball-air-pushy-thingies that you use for sucking out mucus when they're babies - but this time, push air up the OTHER nostril. Since they're connected at some point, you might be able to get a little air to push from behind it. Or, they'll just panic harder, start crying, sniffle and suck it deeper. The good news is that if they suck hard enough, it'll just (depending on size) end up in the back of their throat. Or, yeah, emergency room, then a 17-cent apple turns into a $700 bill.

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    1. No problem brother! The Lysol pics are classic. I could try that technique if she were a little older. As it stands right now, she still doesn't know how to willingly blow her nose. And as for that suction ball, she hates that thing too cuz we sucked out some snot when she was sick a few months ago. #sheremembers

      Thanks for stopping by.

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  4. no, my kids haven't put anything in their noses. But I did when I was a kid. Those little craft beads that you might string up on pipe cleaner. Not sure how we got them out, but I always hear about this story from my family.
    And now I'm just thinking about spicy salmon up my nose...

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    1. Yikes! Craft beads could be dangerous. Hopefully, they were smooth and not the "diamond" looking ones. I think I put a pussy-willow bud up my nose when I was little. I don't remember the outcome though.

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  5. Ahhh, the journey continues...does picking your nose till it bleeds count?

    Matt, please get rid of the captcha thing! You're here all the time and you can delete any inappropriate comments!

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    1. Well, I know that boys love to pick their noses as I was a fierce picker myself.

      And about that Captcha thing, it's gone. Anything for you, Bruce! You're my most frequent commentator. Plus, I know your old eyes must have trouble with those things if I struggle with them. I actually forgot that I could change that setting. I was getting a lot of spam when I first started, so I turned it on. We'll see how things go on "Bruce Sallan Settings". Have a great day!

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