The Tale of the Lost Penny

Sunday afternoon was just like every other Sunday. The girls and I were relaxing and playing. At 4:30pm Alexa came to me crying with tearing streaming down her face. She told me she swallowed her penny. I knew instantly what she was referring to. She held up her smashed penny bracelet and showed me the penny was missing. I quickly asked her again what she said. I was in a bit of shock since Alexa was diagnosed with a sensitive gag reflex. She struggles to swallow different textures and at it's worst she cant even put a new texture to her mouth. The idea of her swallowing or even putting a penny into her mouth is just unheard of. Once it sunk in that she did swallow the penny I went into panic mood. I called Justin several times (he was away at drill) before calling family to get advice. No one seemed to give a solid answer. I ended up calling the pediatrician. I left a message with their after hour nurse and started internet searching.

Once the nurse called me back it was determined that we needed to go to the hospital. Alexa was complaining her throat was hurting and I was super nervous. Once we got to the hospital we had to wait and wait and wait. Alexa's oxygen level was 100% so they weren't quite as concerned. Alexa did so great with the different nurses. She answered all their questions while being very brave. Once we were finally put into a room the doctor ordered x-rays.

After a little more waiting we were taken to the x-ray room. Since Alexa was a minor I had to be with her. Alexa laid on the table while Addison and I stood behind the glass wall. Alexa had 3 x-rays done. One of her throat, one of her middle stomach and one of the lower stomach. After we were back in our room we had about 30 more minutes before the doctor returned. He is informed us that there was no penny in any of the x-rays. Talk about shock! I took me over an hour to calm down. It was very scary to think of my little girl needing surgery. Alexa told the doctor the penny must have disappeared. She still believes she swallowed the penny. I believe that she believes that, but somehow she didn't.

So the penny has not been found. We are still keeping a look out for it and hope to find it soon. Here are some pictures from our scary night. The first one she asked me to take to show her Dad  the penny in her neck. The other two were taken to show her Dad pictures of her tiger gown.