Dave's Mano Quemado (burned hand)

I guess that slide show needs a little explanation. We went to Mexico on a spur of the moment trip. We decided to leave on Wed night and left Thurs morning at 9:00am. The weather was great and the 6 hour drive not to shabby. The we bought some shrimp and it was scrumptous. The kids had fun playing in the tide pools and then Thurs afternoon Dave decided he wanted to take a warm shower (wimp). So he goes out to light the hot water heater, when he comes back in his face is white and his body is black from his chest down and he is holding his hand like it is going to fall off. He smelled of burning flesh. He says, "I think I burned myself." I jump up (no small feet when you are pregnant) and go over to him. His hand looks like it is melting and his whole body is burned. At first I thought I was going to faint. It was bad, but not as bad as I initially thought. All the black was singed and blackened hair. He lost most of the hair on his body. He was bad on his tummy and his hand looked really bad. I took him outside and started the hose and put him under neath it. Then I paced, thinking of plans: Leave to go home to the hospital and leave all the stuff here, come back during the week to lock up, take him to the hospital in San Felipe, what do I do with the kids? He needs a translator. He did not want to leave the water, he said the pain was too bad, but I was watching skin come off in the running water so I knew he needed medical attention. Finally I decided to take him to San Felipe to the hospital. THere were two reasons 1. they could give him a pain killer to get us to the States and 2. It was only a 1/2 hour away, if I filled the ice chest with water then Dave could make it there. Off we went. When we got there they took us right in and they gave Dave an IV, a bowl of cold water to ease the pain, and "el hermano de morfina" in his drip. Pretty soon Dave was loaded enough to let them work on his hand. They cut /scraped off the dead skin and cut some of the blisters off, then they put some green soap on it to clean it. Dave nearly came out of his skin when they did this. Then they put some burn cream (sulfa somethin) on it and wrapped it up good. Then they repeated on his tummy. I paid the bill. One thousand pesos. We go to the car and the battery was dead (of course)because the kids were watching a video, and Phoenix had pressed every button he could. So I got somebody to jump us. Then we went to the farmacia and got some more pain killers (you know it's strong when you have to have a prescription in Mexico). After Dave got some medication in him he felt sleepy so I took him and the kids back to Percebu to pack up. It was late enough that Dave fell asleep and the doctor told me that it was not an emergency so I let him sleep. We left the next morning. His hand will heal and the doctors at Kaiser were reasonably impressed with the job done on his hand. Actually the hospital in Mexico was cleaner and had better service than Kaiser. So all in all it turned out fine. I guess I didn't need to get so anxious, but that's the way with moms. Dave went to work today (Sun) and he hasn't come home so Iguess they let him stay. The burns are second degree, and although he may have scarring he shouldn't have any long lasting affects.

PS I'm trying to figure out how to get the slide show thing down. Bear with me.