Mr. Franklin, while it is true that a penny saved is a penny earned, if that penny is saved inside your son’s colon, it is in fact costing quite a bit more than it is earning.

Last week Ian swallowed a penny.  Actually, he first choked on a penny, but while Brinn tried to dislodge (successfully), it turned and before Brinn could snag in, Ian took a big gulp and his esophageal muscles took it on down.  So now let me back up and share the details of the tale…

Monday morning I woke up to the sound of Ian pounding toys against the rail of his crib –he typically wakes up before my alarm clock goes off, and he doesn’t have a convenient snooze button.  While dragging myself out of bed can be painful some mornings, especially those mornings that I *could* have slept for another 30 minutes, seeing Ian light up like a Christmas tree when I walk through the door makes it all worth it.  So I drug myself to Ian’s room, leaned in for a hug as Ian grinned and grabbed around my neck so I could remove him from his prison-like bars, then carried him on to the living room to start our morning ritual.  Diaper change, jeans and a tee-shirt, and a sippy cup of milk prepared Ian to plop into bed next to his daddy to sip on his milk while I jumped in the shower.  Usually about halfway into a cup of milk Ian gets bored and starts to use Brinn as a jungle gym, so Brinn is forced to get up and dressed and start his day before I get out of the shower.  Before I finished my shower on this particular day, Brinn pounded on the bathroom door.  All I heard was “choke” and “Ian.”

With no contacts in, I couldn’t find my glasses or a phone to call our doctor’s emergency number.  In my panicked state, I concluded that the best course of action involved strapping my choking toddler in a car seat and rushing to the hospital…with no contacts or glasses…in a towel…with soap in my hair…  At this point, the penny went down, Ian lost his red tinge, started breathing well enough to scream, then jumped up and decided to go back to playing.  Brinn convinced me that we could safely wait the additional 15 minutes until the doctor’s office opened, and I could finish my shower.  It’s a good thing I can totally keep my cool in a stressful situation, right?

I went on to work shortly after our incident, leaving Brinn with strict instructions to call me immediately if anything seemed amiss.  Brinn called the doctor and the doctor said… and here’s the part of the story where I feel like I’m reading Ian his favorite book (for the 567th time), “Momma called the doctor and the doctor said: “No more puppies jumping in the bed!'”)… In all seriousness, the doctor said to watch Ian, but so long as he’s breathing and eating fine, then he’s okay.  BUT if he spikes a fever bring him in right away.  The rest of Monday passed by without incident, and we proceeded on into Tuesday.

Ian goes to preschool on Tuesday, so when we dropped him off, Brinn and I informed the teachers about Ian’s copper snacking habits, and asked them to please call us right away if he seemed to have any issues or developed a fever.  Guess who grew warmer throughout the day?  At 3:00, Jacob’s Ladder (doesn’t the school have such a great name!) called to inform Brinn that Ian was running a fever, so Brinn headed straight to the doctor with him and the doctor said… See! I keep reliving this book over and over.  Dr. Batson decided that we needed X-ray’s of Ian’s torso just to be sure.

The boys picked me up from work and off we went to the hospital’s imaging center for Ian’s glamor shots.  At this point, Ian hadn’t had a good nap, he’d eaten little, his bad parents didn’t bring a cup of milk, and water was not an acceptable substitute.  We had one mad little boy on our hands, and he was not interested in posing for the X-Ray tech.  Brinn and I ended up having to stand on either side of Ian, and holding him down while the wonderful technician worked as quickly as she could to snap the image.  All the while Ian screamed at the top of his lungs.  For such an agreeable guy, he had no trouble belting it out when he felt affronted.

Did I mention that through all of this I was missing a lovely dinner with Virginia and Dr. Laird?  No soup, salad, and bread sticks for me that evening.  After this incredibly stressful evening, we returned home to get Ian a cup of milk and a tube of yogurt.  Within minutes of eating, he was running around and playing with Mogwai and Chaco while I threw together a quick dinner for Brinn and I.  Once our chicken alfredo (my last attempt at salvaging my Olive Garden evening) was ready, we sat down to eat and put a little on Ian’s plate, not expecting him to eat very much.  Guess who had 3 servings (and then licked his plate clean)!

After a very messy meal, the hospital called to let us know that the penny had nearly passed, but the fever was coming from an upper respiratory infection.  Poor little guy!  I guess I’d be a bit of a crankpot too!