Penny Candy???

Mathias is such a good kid but every once in a while he does something that makes us shake our heads and ask, "why?" On wednesday night Mathias found two pennies on the table and was playing with them the way he usually does. He will carry the money around announcing to everyone that he has money and then puts it in his pocket. I was in the kitchen making dinner and Mathias was over by the table when he started caughing and choking. He came over to me and he was gagging and choking on something. I immediately flipped him over my knee and hit him on the back. He stopped choking and swallowed hard. I asked him what he had in his mouth and he replied, "Money, bye, bye." I was thinking, "Oh, crap!" and told Brian what happened. (He heard it happening but was in the other room.) I went over to the table to look for the pennies thinking maybe he got into the candy on the table and that was what he was choking on. Nope. There was only one penny on the table. Mathias started talking about having money in his mouth and saying bye, bye. All this from the child that NEVER put anything other than food into his mouth. We gave Mathias a drink to see if it was stuck in his esophagus and luckily he was able to eat and drink just fine. In fact, Mathias didn't seem bothered at all. I called my sister, Amy, because her son had done this twice and asked what we should do. Amy said the first time they waited a few days for the penny to pass on its own and when it didn't and he got sick, they took him to the ER. The second time it was caught in his throat and they had to take him into the ER right away. Either way, she said we should take him in to have an x-ray just to make sure it isn't stuck anywhere.

Since Mathias was able to eat OK and didn't seem bothered by the fact that he had just swallowed a penny, we decided to wait and call the doctor in the morning. The next morning I called the pediatrician's office and asked them how long we should wait for the penny to pass on its own before bringing Mathias in. The nurse told me that I needed to bring him in that day for an x-ray because of his age. I called Brian at work and told him what was going on and about 20 minutes later he called me back and said he was on his way home. I was grateful he came home to go with us since I couldn't be with Mathias during the x-ray because I'm pregnant.

We got to the doctor's office and the doctor examined Mathias. Everything seemed to be fine from the outside but we still needed the x-ray to see where the penny was. The doctor was laughing at the situation because she had another little boy in the next room who had done the same thing. We later saw his x-ray next to Mathias's.

We went over to the x-ray area and Brian took Mathias in while I waited helplessly in the waiting room. After they had been gone for a minute, I could hear my poor little boy screaming for dear life. I felt so bad, but there was nothing I could do. Brian said he had to undress Mathias so that the snaps on his clothes would not interfere with the x-ray. Mathias did not like anything about that room. The technician had Brian lay Mathias down on the table and Mathias would not hold still so they had to strap him down with his hands over his head. Brian said that Mathias was so strong that it took THREE people to strap him down to the table. I heard a brief break in the crying and I guess Mathias liked looking at the lights of the x-ray machine. Then the screaming started back up. Brian got him dressed again and came out with the x-ray.

We went back over to where the doctor was waiting for us and she looked at the x-ray. The penny was still in Mathias's stomach resting on a lot of food. The doctor said that it can take up to THREE WEEKS for the penny to pass! I can't believe it can take that long. But, there is no danger to Mathias unless it gets stuck somewhere which is unlikely. So, until it passes, Brian and I get to search Mathias's poop looking for the penny. Just let me tell you how pleasant that is. Hopefully the penny will come out soon and there will not be any problems. I'm still shaking my head at the whole situation.