Can we press pause on this adreneline rush, please?

We've had an exhausting week here at the Quigley household. I'm just about ready to lock the doors, close the blinds and keep out the world. Of course, with Annie's daredevil instincts, I'd probably have to tie her up to keep her safe...

So, where to start? First, Tuesday we got some (potentially) good news about which I'm not yet allowed to talk. No, it doesn't involve anything like pregnancy--that would not be good news for us. :) Let me say, though, that it has the potential of being something wonderful for our family, so I can't wait to see how it all unfolds.

So that was Tuesday. Last night (Wednesday), while I was getting ready for bed, Jake got out of bed, came into the bathroom to see me, and said, "I just have to check out something that hurts." He drops his pants, and there is a strange...thing...on his penis. (Is this TMI? I have to share this to get to the funny part.) I call Ike in, and between the two of us we determine that it's something very weird and NOT GOOD. What we decide after a conversation with Granny (a nurse practitioner who deals with more of our health questions than anyone else has to) and a lot of internet research is that it's a staph infection caused by our nasty bathtub.

Okay, that's what I decided. Ike kept insisting that even if it was an infection, our bathtub didn't cause it. But I knew differently. I started cleaning. More than ever before. The bleach smell is deadly even this afternoon. But it's clean and will never be dirty again. (By the way, in case anyone is taking this seriously, no, our tub wasn't THAT bad. But now I think you could eat off of it.)

First thing this morning I called Dr. Sumner's office for an appointment. "Yes, my son has a strange growth on his penis. Yes this is the same little boy who slammed said penis with a toilet lid at the age of 3. And yes, he's the one who kicked a mirror until it fell and broke his toe. Yes, that one."

We went in to see a different doctor, whom we'd never met. He said (seriously), "Well, this will be interesting. Certainly breaks up the monotony of the day."

That's what we're here for, doc: your entertainment needs.

The doctor took one look at this growth, reached down...and pulled it off. Jake said, "OWW! Oh, I'm glad that's off." This was my first clue. Infections and lesions do not just pull off.

Let me point out right now that even the doctor didn't know what it was. He muttered that he didn't think it was a tick, but he wanted to put it under the microscope just in case. Now I've had conversations with some of you about ticks, so you may know that I'm more afraid of ticks than snakes, tornadoes, the boogeyman...anything. So this was my new big fear: my son has Lyme disease.

When the doctor came back, he reported the news: "It's a booger."

I'm sorry, what?

"A booger."

But he said it hurt.

"Yes, it must have been stuck on pretty well. You know, they are gelatinous."

Yuck. So that was our first trauma of the day, averted. On to Trauma 2.

Since Jake was healthy with no diseases after all, I decided to work on clogging his arteries (to give him something to worry about when he's middle-aged). We went to McDonalds. In the drive thru line, just as I was ordering, Jake started saying, "Um, Mom? A little help here? Mom, I need your help."

I'm a saintly, patient mother, so I said, "Jake! Not now, don't you see I'm ordering??"

It was only when I got to the first window that I looked back and saw the problem. Jake had his seatbelt wrapped around his neck. He said he'd wanted to try to make a necklace...

Again, I'm a saintly, patient, kind mother who handles anything with grace and understanding, so I said, "Jake! What are you doing? What were you thinking? Well, I can't help you with that until we get through the drive thru!"

At the second window, the woman handing me my food said, "He's choking hisself."

I know, McDonalds Window Lady. And it's himself.

I parked the car, got out to help Jake...and then started to panic. Jake had pulled the seatbelt all the way out to loosen it to put it around his neck (he'd unbuckled it at this point, too), then when he let go of it, the belt "locked" and could not be loosened again. In other words, it was as tight as it could get. He wasn't choking, but the loop wasn't big enough for his head to fit through.

I called Ike (who left the movie set to join us because as he said, it's pretty hard to just sit there and wonder if your son is choking), then called 911. Two officers came to help us. They worked on him for what felt like 30 minutes and had almost decided to cut the belt (even had their multi-tool out to do so), when they found construction workers eating at McDonalds. They borrowed wrenches from those guys and unscrewed the bolt at the top of the belt.

Jake slipped out with just a few red marks on his neck as a reminder of what happened. The officers gave him a teddy bear (now named, "Officer Bear") and turned on their blue lights for Jake to see. They lectured him on not doing that again, but really? I don't think he'll even try...

On top of all of this, I found out this morning that a good friend of mine was in a wreck last night and her car was totaled. She just happened to not have her kids in the car with her, otherwise, they probably wouldn't have survived.

It's all just a little too much this week. But hey, at least my son doesn't have skin cancer or something...