Doctor in the House

Last night as I was taking my worn out jammies from the dresser I somehow managed to bring my middle finger knuckle down hard on the corner of the drawer. Impressively no shouting of anything inappropriate leaked out, just a loud, "Arrrrgggghhhh". Stuart came upstairs and I said, "I think I might have broken my finger." He came to look at it and said, "That looks really bad." Already it had begun swelling and showing discoloration.

Still trying to be Regular Mom, I continued the happy job of trying to shuffle kids off to bed. Claire was being slow so I said, "Claire I think I might have broken my finger. I need some help here, can you please go to bed?" At this Claire corners me into the bathroom saying, "Oh, let me look at it. Come on let me see it. I know all about these things, I really do."

Caught off guard by her sudden development of medical knowledge I allowed her to examine my hand. I tentatively held out my hand, which she grabbed, and said, "which finger is it?" "It's the one that's swollen and purple." I replied. "Oh." she said. "Well bend it." I attempted to appease my young physician by trying to bend the finger. Unimpressed with my results she grabbed my finger and quickly bent it back as far as she could. As I yelped and jerked my hand back she pronouced her diagnosis, "It's not broken."

Half laughing half crying I said, "Claire, just because you can force the finger to bend back doesn't mean it's not broken. You just want to know if it hurts when you do bend it." She said, "Oh, sorry. Didn't know. Go put some ice on it." Still doing a mixture of laughing and crying I went and got ice for my finger. After all, I wouldn't want to disobey my doctor's orders--even if her medical training is still a work in process.