This evening Rachel and I spent 4 hours at what is becoming her second home: the emergency room. This time she got 8 stitches in the back of her head. She and David were messing about on the living room sofa. At the moment when I told them both to get down, Rachel was standing on the back of the sofa. David put his arms around her shins and tried to pick her up then they both fell backwards and crashed into the coffee table. I didn't realise that anything was seriously wrong until Helen pointed to spots of blood on the kitchen floor. She had a 3cm cut on the back of her head. I had already had experience of how brave she is when they drew blood from her arm for allergy testing. She watched them draw blood and hardly flinched. Tonight she was a trouper again. I declined the medicine that would make her sleepy and less aware of what was going on. Instead they numbed the area with some medicinal gel and she just lay on her side and didn't make a sound while the surgeon stitched her up.