Metal Meredith

1. Make sure child is hurt.
2. Take good care of child.
3. Allow child to snuggle sadness away in your bed.
4. Shower with love and attention and kisses.
5. After 3 days, tell child to sleep in own bed.
6. Leave room.
7. Wait 75 minutes for screaming to end.

Fin.

Sad, Sad boy.

Henry has never been sure-footed. We can blame it on his big feet, on the habit of walking tip-toed, or on his lack of attention paid to anything underfoot. There have been a lot of close calls with him tumbling down, scraping hands and knees and on occasion, faces. He has smacked his head, chin, arms, legs, and back on any various number of items. He has been bruised and had many a goose eggs. Until now, these have all been normal childhood owies.

Phil called me on Friday afternoon, on his way home from the playground. He said “I need you to be outside when we get home. Henry fell on the sidewalk and is hurt pretty bad. He has either hurt his lip or lost a tooth.”

When they tore down the street into the driveway, I was waiting with a soft, damp wash cloth hoping for the best, a split lip. I opened the door to Vivienne holding up a tooth and a blood covered Henry. My poor baby boy had fallen teeth first onto the sidewalk and scraped himself up badly.

It took about 10 minutes to locate all the scrapes and cuts. It took about 10 more minutes to get him all cleaned up and another 20 for him to become totally calm. His stomach hurt from all that blood that he was swallowing. We called the dentist (closed for the holiday) and the pediatrician (also closed for the holiday). I finally got a hold of a receptionist at KidMed, a urgent care center for children, who happened to be a dental hygienist during the day. She assured us that while sad, this happens all the time and there isn’t much to be done for baby teeth. After paging the dentist, he assured me the same thing.

Henry is better today. He is eating, after 18 hours of refusing to. He shoves little torn pieces of food way back onto his molars and then chews. He only drinks through straws placed through the very side of his mouth, shoved between his back teeth. I am just glad he is eating at all.

The best/worst thing to come out of this is his having to give up the pacifier cold turkey. He isn’t enjoying it and there is a lot of tossing and turning at night, but it had to happen sooner or later. He likes to hold them but he won’t put them in his mouth because he is scared. Could be a good thing, but I am sure it will suck for a few days.

I will confess, I have an addiction to some online games. I can be found wasting my time farming, running a restaurant or keeping up my aquariums. Its sad really, how much time I waste taking care of these things. But it is fun none the less!