Our ten year old got her first prescription glasses last Saturday. She was beaming with joy saying, “finally, I can see everything clearly now!” Her vision is not perfect anymore, as I would have hoped. My husband is practically blind without his glasses. I think Pristine got the bad vision DNA.

She had her glasses on Saturday night after a visit to the eye doctor.

Less than 48 hours after she got the glasses, she almost went blind because of a freak accident.

MONDAY 23 June 2014
She fell down in school (details I am not really sure), face first and the one of the glasses broke. She had a wound on her face, just above her eyes, below her eyebrows, near the nose. The nurse called me and said there was some bleeding otherwise my daughter was ok. She “suggested” you might want to check with a doctor or surgeon later. My husband picked up Pristine and they came to my office. She was fine with a bandage near her forehead.

She didn’t want me to touch that part or open the bandage to see the wound. She slept fine Monday night.

TUESDAY 24 June 2014
Next morning, we didn’t send her to school because anyway classes are over, they just need to officially end it this week. They just play and do French day, etc until Thursday. I got a call from the nurse: “Did you take Pristine to the surgeon?” There was a sense of urgency and fright in her voice, unlike the day of the accident when she was in a relaxed tone as she told me my daughter is ok. I said no because she is ok.

“You MUST take her to the doctor, she needs Tetanus shot!”

I was scared and immediately picked Pristine up and we went to the clinic near my office. When the general practitioner doctor opened the bandage, he was like, “WHOA!” and I almost fainted. The doctor told me to go to Rashid Hospital emergency unit.

At Rashid Hospital, the doctor was furious why she wasn’t rushed to emergency on Monday, when it happened – the wound was that bad! It wasn’t “just a scratch” or a “simple cut” or “because of friction against surface” as what the school doctor and nurse told me and my husband (who picked Pristine from school on the day of the accident), it was a deep scrape. Some flesh was scraped, not just skin. It was a horrible sight.

The emergency doctor called the in-charge of plastic surgery because he thought it needed a more specialist opinion since the scar is in the face. Luckily, the plastic surgeon said since Pristine is still young, her skin is still flexible, stitching should be ok. She got SIX stitches! That’s not a minor wound in any parent or doctor’s dictionary!

My husband is furious with the school nurse and doctor.

We know we are also at fault why we didn’t check our child’s wound (I swear to God, she didn’t want us to touch it or open the bandage). She was ok so we left it like that. And we left it like that confident of what the school’s medical professional’s story that “it’s not that bad” and “nothing to worry”. They did tell us to “go to a surgeon – just in case” BUT there was no urgency nor impact with the way they said it, like it was only an option. I wish they could have implied it more , fiercely that she needs to be taken to the doctor immediately because they were the one who saw it first, saw the severity of it.

They were there immediately after it happened. I don’t want to put the entire blame on them but I really think they didn’t handle the situation well. I wrote to the school principal requesting her to have a word with the nurse/doctor to never hesitate to rush children to the emergency if they see and feel the need for it. Or tell the parents the real situation, never mind we panic. It is so much better to think of the worse rather than relax and wait for the worse. I still thank the nurse though for following up with me yesterday but I wish she could have urged me more to take Pristine to the doctor last Monday.

I felt so sorry for Pristine. She was screaming and crying at the surgery room. She almost crushed my hands squeezing it so hard like she’s holding on to dear life. I saw needles, bloody gauzes and heard cold screams from my child. It still sends shivers down my spine to recall that moment when I had to be strong for her and I am so weak with these kind of things.

Pristine is ok now, resting at home. Glad that school is over but after all this, I think of how the scar would affect her. It will be a prominent one, right near her eyes – right where people see you first. While I am still thankful that it wasn’t worse (like the piece of broken glass could have gone inside her eyes God forbid!!) but still, my beautiful daughter’s face will never be the same.