Meghan’s Big Toe
My husband and I sent our youngest off to university 500 miles from home and two hours west of Toronto, with the typical parental concerns about her living on her own. Would she be homesick? Would she eat properly? Would she be safe? As much as Meghan relished the prospect of freedom, we did get panic phone calls in her first year. She had roommate drama (one of the girls had loud late-night phone arguments with her mother), switched her major, and struggled to feed her lactose-intolerant self. We didn’t hear much about the partying, though. That is, until Halloween of her second year.
After a year of residence life and cafeteria food, Meghan moved into an old house with five other students. The street, known for its wild parties, was nicknamed “the student ghetto” but she had a good group of friends and wasn’t usually pressured into conforming. That gave me some comfort. One of her housemates, Brendon, a sweet and strapping boy, was the head of the student emergency response team. My comfort doubled. Another roommate, Sara, was a local and her mom was a nurse. My comfort multiplied. Not that I thought we’d need their services, but it was like insurance.
Meghan mentioned they were starting their Halloween celebrations late in the afternoon along with thousands of students in the busy university town. She hadn’t disclosed her costume choice and I hadn’t asked. I was given a quota on how many questions I could ask my only daughter and decided to forego wasting one. The previous year, she and her friends dressed as the dancers from Chicago, complete with fish net stockings, bustiers, and short black somethings. I was grateful I’d been kept in the dark and had no desire to know what they’d dreamt up in second year. The phone calls started the morning after Halloween.
“Hi mom. There’s something wrong with my big toe. I wore high-heeled pointy-toed shoes last night and there were no cabs so we walked downtown to the bars and back.”
“Describe it to me. How long is your toenail? It could be ingrown.” I tried to be sympathetic to her plight but it was her choice to bar-hop in unsuitable footwear.
“Well, Brendon looked at it. He tried ice and heat and both killed – I could feel my heartbeat in my toe!! It’s swollen, sore, and bright red. I couldn’t sleep. Even the sheets bothered it.”
“Can you walk?”
“Just barely. I need to get to class but I have no idea how.”
“Well, they’ll hardly excuse you for a sore toe. Head to the walk-in clinic on campus, at least. It’s not that far. I’m sure you’ll make it but maybe ask Jenna if she’ll go with you.” Jenna was a sweet girl whose nearby family had all but adopted Meghan. I suggested she soak her foot in epsom salts and thought nothing of it until her phone call the next day.
“Mom, I don’t feel well. I think I have a fever. I’m nauseous, too and it’s like I have the flu. And my toe looks angry. They were no help at the walk-in.”
A distant memory surfaced and I tried to keep my composure. “Is there a red line going up your leg?”
“A red line? Nope. What do you mean?”
It had been about twenty years since I’d experienced the red line with flu-like symptoms. The first time was the result of an infected fingernail when the rusty wire from one of my keepsake stuffed toys poked through the fur and stabbed me. The second time, I’d burned my wrist taking cookies out of the oven. I decided that exposing it to the sun might dry up the weeping welt. I was mistaken. Both times, my mother-in-law noticed the symptoms of blood poisoning and detected the red line travelling up my arm.
In an attempt to appeal to my daughter’s no-nonsense personality, impart a sense of urgency, and cut through her teenage invincibility shield, I said, “If you see a red line, head to the nearest emergency room right away. If that line travels to your heart, you’ll die.” I didn’t know if the last part was true but it got my attention when my mother-in-law said it to me and it got Meghan’s too.
“Mo-ommmmm!!! You’re scaring me.”
I explained what blood poisoning was and told her to confirm with Sara’s mom if she didn’t believe me. I was heading out the door to catch a flight to Toronto to attend meetings the next day and present at a conference the day after. I initiated multiple backup plans starting with warning my Toronto-based boss that I might be taking a side trip to tend to my daughter’s toe. My husband’s family, who lived an hour west of the university, were also on high alert.
My phone rang early the next morning.
“Mom, there’s a red line! Up to my ankle!”
“Ok, sweetie. Put a mark where the line ends. Who else is awake at your house? Grab a friend, call a cab and get yourself to Emergency right now.”
“Brendon has a car and Jenna will come. But wait. What are they going to do to me?”
When it happened to me, I was grateful my mother-in-law had been direct so without preamble, I said, “They’re going to put a needle in your toe to freeze it and another needle to lance it and draw the infection out.”
That got me another, “Mo-ommmmm!” and “Will it hurt?”
“Yes, it will hurt, sweetie. Now, get yourself to the hospital!”
I called my husband’s family and went to my boss’s office to give him the toe update. His pallor and open-palmed stance as he backed away told me he didn’t want details.
“I’m good. Don’t need to know. Take as much time as you need.”
Meghan updated me later. Brendon had hoisted her over his shoulder, Jenna had held her hand through the lancing and, in order to shorten their wait, they’d chosen a hospital that didn’t accept ambulances (how university kids knew this detail was a question I didn’t want answered). My sister-in-law, Ruth, and her husband collected my daughter and brought her home with them. The following day, I drove to Ruth’s, a three-hour drive that felt like ten. She’d phoned me earlier with assurances that Meghan was tired and pale but otherwise fine and being spoiled. Her grandmother and auntie had taken her to the required follow-up at a walk-in clinic above the Superstore and plied her with treats and magazines. Her dressing had been changed, the red line was receding away from her heart, and the toe would live to bar-hop again.
That evening, after wrapping her in my arms and masking my alarm at her complexion, she recounted how her friends had rallied and how she’d dealt with her missed classes. Since she was sharing, I disregarded the question quota and asked about her costume.
She perked up. “Oh, I was Minnie Mouse. Want to see a picture? Didn’t the shoes look so cute?”
I smiled while wondering when Minnie’s skirt got that short and wished I hadn’t asked.
