Surgery and Stealing

So it's been a few years since I needed surgery.
Thank goodness.

But the scars and stories give me a little street cred with the kids. ;)

One of our summer kids is going to have surgery tomorrow to fix some broken bones in his hand. He was understandably nervous, but the things that I worried about when I had surgery aren't even on his mind. I know I'm not the only person who worries, "what if I don't wake up after anesthesia?"

That's really unlikely, of course. But that was a big worry.
After that, the biggest worry was the amount of pain I'd have to go through during recovery.
I wasn't wrong about that.
Jesus.

HIS biggest fear is getting a shot. Needles. I remember being the same way as a child. Of course now it's really no big deal. I can actually watch them stick needles in my arm or my hand and just go, 'meh'.

So we had a lot of discussion today. Not just the two of us. Several kids joined in. We talked about IVs and scars and blood and stitches and oxygen and hospitals and doctors.

When Jay's* mom came to pick him up, I told her that he was apprehensive. She thanked me for being there for him to talk to, and for not lying to him. I guess there was a person last time he had surgery (a family member, I think) who told him that it wouldn't hurt a bit.

He doesn't remember the last one. They gave him a type of medication that made him forget. So he's worried about the needles more than anything. He said he knows they hurt. I said yes, it does hurt, but that the cannula they put in your vein makes it possible for you to have as many shots as they need to give you without it hurting any more. That's what that thing's for.

There was a great deal of discussion. All kinds of stories.
I was glad I was there for him to talk to.
He'll be back next week with a cast on.

He's already planning to have everyone sign it and deciding what color his cast should be.
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We have someone in our little group this summer who seems to be a little light-fingered.

We're missing some of our more interesting Lego pieces. They've disappeared a little bit at a time.

Some of the magnet construction set is disappearing, too. There's about a third of the set gone now.

And yesterday, we had DS day. Kids brought hand held video games. We've done this for five years, and never had an issue... until yesterday. Two kids had a video game cartridge stolen.

Both of those boys sat next to the same boy. A boy we've caught taking things before. Of course we can't place blame if we didn't actually see it happen. We're all pissed off.

Sunshine is going to post a notice on the parent table, hoping that one of the suspect's parents will read it and check his video games. We can't tell them we think it was him, but we've caught him 'accidentally' putting things that do not belong to him in his basket when it's time to put things away at the end of the day, and he's one of the few kids who brings a backpack.

They don't really need one during the summer, of course.

And I resent the extra work of monitoring a child who seems to have sticky fingers. It once again takes away from the other kids. So sort of taking from them double... once if he steals something and once when I am paying attention to what he's taking home instead of a child who needs my attention with a project.

Summer's half over.
Summer's half over.
:::sigh:::