Last Saturday morning started off with a nice peaceful feel. It was oddly productively lazy. The house was clean, the kids were playing nicely and there was a calm that hovered over. A calm before the storm.

Around 11 am, as we are all getting ready to leave for a friend’s birthday party, Hannah asked to have a vitamin. As I got the bottle, she asked to take out the vitamin herself. I obliged. Then she asked if she could give one to Julia. I obliged. And then, in the busyness of getting ready, I lost track of the bottle.

After some time, Hannah came up to me, vitamin bottle in hand, and said “Mama, there’s only two left!”

We immediately start questioning Hannah as to where the vitamins were. Turns out she ate them. We aren’t completely certain, but our closest estimate is that Hannah consumed about 30 iron fortified chewable vitamins.

I immediately called my mom {who’s a nurse}, while Jonathan started searching on Google for overdose risk. My mom calmly advised that we take her to urgent care, just to make sure that nothing serious happens. And then Jonathan read this ::

Iron overdose is considered a leading cause of poisoning-related death in young children.

Let me just say – that one sentence can evoke a fear I didn’t know existed. Before I knew what happened, Jonathan grabbed Hannah and rushed her to the ER. Over the next 3 hours, they ran tests and X-rays on Hannah to determine her toxicity level.

Being the parent that stays behind is painful. For the first hour and a half, I only got information as Jonathan was able to text it. Once the X-ray was complete and the radiologist was consulted, the doctor said that Hannah was on the lower end of being in danger {quote “a 3 out of 10”}. She and Jonathan were sent home where we were to monitor her for vomiting, diarrhea and lethargic behavior.

With in 30 minutes of being home, Hannah began exhibiting all the signs the doctor described. We went on a “watch and wait” system to determine if we needed to have her re-admitted. We prayed and decided to keep her home and let her nap {by this time it was a good two hours past her normal naptime}. She curled up in our bed with Jonathan, were they both slept off the eventful morning.

By that evening, Hannah said she felt much better. She was still having a few GI issues, but was holding down her food and drink. We had her sleep in our room overnight so we could be nearby in case any issues arose. Thankfully they didn’t, and by Sunday morning, the vitamin fiasco was like a bad dream.

Funny enough, when I was Hannah’s age, I overdosed on some children’s medicine. Looks like the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

Did you ever overdose as a child? If you have kids, have you ever had an overdose scare?