This morning, Mairin was playing with a necklace she had made - basically a fat, bright-pink shoelace with colorful, chunky beads strung on it.
She was quiet for a moment (never a good sign).
MAIRIN: "I lost the pink bead, mama."
ME: "Where did it go?"
MAIRIN: "In my nose."
I remained as calm as possible and inspected my little prankster.
It didn't look like she had anything jammed up in her nose. However, when I gently palpitated the side of her right nostril, sure as anything, there was a hard lump.
Luckily, she didn't pack it up in there. I knew it was a smooth little object and after a few quick downward strokes, it fell out.
ME: Deep breath. "Why did you do that?"
MAIRIN: "I don't know. I just wanted to try it."
ME: "Will you ever do that again?"
MAIRIN: "No. NEVER. I was scared (pronounced skee-ad)."
I'm not sure why I even asked her why she did it. I knew the answer.
I knew the answer because almost everyone I know has had a similar experience - both as a parent and as a curious child.
I wedged a raisin up my nose when I was three. By the time we removed it, it was a grape. Just this morning, my nanny confided that her parents fished a band-aid out of her nose, and my neighbor ... a pea.
I'm sure none of us knew why we did it, other than the obvious fact that it seemed like a good idea at the time. Experts have a few theories of their own.
“This is how children investigate their environment,” said Dr. Jonathan Powell, a pediatrician with Resurrection Medical Group in Chicago. “When they are babies, they stick everything in their mouth. As they get a little older, they try other places. It’s very common.”
Dr. Michael Pitt, the director of the Pediatric Convenient Care Clinic at Lurie’s Children’s Hospital of Chicago, said this happens most often in kids between the ages of one and six.
“I think there’s a misconception that boys do this more than girls but that’s not the case,” Pitt said. “For items found in the ears, it’s equal between girls and boys, but for the nose, it’s 2 to 1 (ratio) girls.”
The most common things found in the nose, Pitt said, are Barbie shoes. Other popular items, according to Pitt and Powell, include Legos, beads, seeds, coins and erasers.
If you find yourself in this situation as a parent, all on-line research indicates that you should not attempt to remove the object by putting anything up into your child's nose - such as a Q-Tip or tweezers. Tweezers may be used by a medical practitioner, but generally a last resort as nasal cartilage is delicate in a wee one and can be damaged easily.
From my cursory research, other methods a doctor may use to remove an object include magnets (for metallic objects), oil (should an insect be the object), holding one nostril shut and having the child blow, or holding the nostril shut and having the parent puff lightly into the child's mouth with their own (Mother's Kiss technique).
The bottom line is, if your child puts a foreign object in his or her nose, you may find yourself at the doctor's office.
And, if you simply must ask "Why did you do this?" Fully expect the answer to be a resounding, "I don't know."
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