Would you like some plate with that?

Last Saturday I was in the kitchen while Gracie was eating her breakfast, and I heard sharp cracking sound.  I thought it was her sippy cup hitting the wood floor in the dining area.  A few minutes later I went to check on her, only to discover that she had bitten off a piece of a Ronald McDonald plate!  These plates are made from some type of very hard plastic.  It’s amazing Gracie hasn’t broken any of her teeth. 

So I hurry and get a wooden spoon to pry her mouth open, and see that she’s chewed up the piece into small shards.  With her mouth pried open, I remove the plastic using my fingers, praying she doesn’t bite me.  Then I call the Poison Center, resigning myself to another possible trip to ER.   

Anyway, I want to freak out and start yelling at the Poison Center operator, but I keep my cool.  The operator asks, “Is she drooling, does she have cuts in her mouth, is she breathing and swallowing normally, has her behavior changed since ingesting the plate pieces?”  No, a tiny cut, yes, and no.  “Okay, she’ll likely pass them,” the operator says.  All the while, Gracie is crying in the background, as she’s been doing for the last few days because of her double swimmer’s ear.  I’m thinking I should put the Poison Center’s phone number on speed dial, as many times as we have called them.  By the way the center’s number is:

1-800-222-1222

If you potentially have a need for this number, write it down and put it somewhere it can easily be found.  In our case we have this number on our refrigerator.  Finally, the link to the Poison Center is www.poison.org.  Some interesting information on that site.