Mommy By The Book » toddlers

Wherein I am put in my place by a toddler

Rachel — Sat, 20 Aug 2011 23:01:51 +0000

The conversation in the car today with the 3 year old:

Claire: “I want a hamburger!”

Me: “Sorry sweetie, we are going to eat at home instead because you didn’t obey me at Grandma’s house and pick up your toys when I asked.”

Claire: “I want a hamburgerrrr!!!”

Me: “I know, but I told you we could get one if you were obedient and picked up your toys, but you didn’t listen to me and had to go to time out instead.”

Claire: “But I don’t want to eat at home! I want a hamburger!”

Me: “Sorry honey, we’ll get one another time. I still love you though.”

*silence*

Claire: “I love Daddy.”

I think I’ve found a good excuse to never run on the treadmill again

Rachel — Thu, 19 May 2011 20:29:09 +0000

My cute girl with two functioning, non-mangled hands

So, do you want the good news or the bad news first? Bad news? Ok then, glad we agree.

Two weeks ago the husband was running on the treadmill in the basement while our daughter played and watched cartoons in the same room. We’ve had this set-up for a while, we’ve had conversations about never ever ever touching the treadmill while it is on, and all has gone smoothly. You can see where this is going. For some inexplicable reason my little girl decided to wander on over and stick her sweet, soft, innocent little hand under the moving treadmill belt and IT GOT STUCK.

My husband called me at work, in a panic because Claire was completely freaking out and would not stop screaming, even to the point of throwing up. I was trapped, having joined a carpool (which is a post in itself) the week before. From what I could gather there was very little blood, but a lot of skin had been taken off and my poor girl was miserable. There wasn’t anything that looked like it needed to be stitched up, even though her hand was quite mangled, so we didn’t go to the ER. It looked like what it needed was some good old fashioned antibacterial ointment, some time to heal, and some major TLC. That day (and the next few as well) that girl got whatever she wanted in our desperate attempt to bring her any sort of comfort and happiness. Watch movies all day? Sure! You want popsicles for dinner? You got it! Here, have some chocolate too!!

The following days were downright heartbreaking and completely stressful for all of us. Her hand had to be bandaged and protected. The first night I loosely taped some gauze to her hand, slathering it all with antibacterial ointment. The next morning, to my horror, the gauze had dried to her oozing, open wounds. We had to try to force her hand underwater per her doctor’s suggestion (which is painful on such sensitive wounds) and then yank the gauze off. Just typing that sentence makes me ill all over again. I’m sure I don’t even need to describe the howling on my daughter’s part. I raced to the nearest pharmacy in a frenzy, sweeping into my basket non-stick gauze and antibacterial sprays and band-aids with cartoon characters on them and anything else that looked remotely helpful.

In an effort to protect her damaged hand, my girl would keep it in a fist and wouldn’t let anyone or anything near it. While I praised her basic survival instincts and tenacity at keeping us from touching it, that hand absolutely had to be tended to in order to prevent infection and ensure proper healing. Even in her sleep, if I would try to touch her hand to adjust the bandages she would quickly jerk it away. Changing the bandages became a 3-man job that I would dread for over an hour before the appointed time to make it happen with the assistance of one of her grandmothers. Grandma would hold her tightly in her lap, while my husband gingerly pried her shredded fingers open and I sprayed and bandaged and taped as quickly as my inexperienced hands would allow. Claire made sure to fulfill her role in this as well and would scream and thrash as much as she possibly could. Each bandaging session left me feeling guilty for causing her pain, frazzled, and beyond anxious. Luckily, after several days this process was downgraded from a 3-man job to a 2-man operation and now, finally, is one-woman gig. (Lucky me).

Things looked like they were making slow but steady progress on most of her hand, but her 4th finger (the ring finger on her left hand, no less) just is not keeping up. That poor finger got the worst of the damage, it seems, and has had great difficulty healing. For almost a week I couldn’t even get a good look at it because she would not open her hand for anything, and when we’d force her hand open all the thrashing about prevented me from seeing much. A few days ago she FINALLY started opening her hand on command, even patiently allowing me to bandage her up with only minor whimpering, and one part of her finger is still all gooey and oozy and fleshy and mangled and just…awful. On Monday she began acting lethargic and feverish, and I panicked thinking infection had set in at last and called the doctor.

Fortunately, the doctor didn’t seem as panicked as I felt and offered some good advice and prescribed an antibiotic to stave of what looked to be just the beginnings of a bacterial infection. He did say, though, that while it looked like tissue was regenerating in the deepest part of the wound, it appeared there was still dead tissue stuck in there that needed to come out. I’m pretty sure I lost all color at that point, because he quickly assured me I wouldn’t have to scrub it, for heavens sake, but we still would need to care for it. He suggested wrapping it in regular gauze as opposed to the non-stick kind, allowing it to dry and stick to the wound, soaking it in water and then taking it off in an effort to remove the dead tissue with it. My stomach immediately knotted up and I wanted to positively beg him to take my daughter home with him for the next 3 days so he could take care of it, because I was done. I could NOT intentionally cause my daughter any more pain. No no no no no.

The unfortunate thing about being a parent is that you cannot simply drop your child off with someone else when the tough stuff happens. You now must be the hero. I remember reading an article once in my pre-child days where the writer described his young child dealing with some sort of worm/parasite thing? And for weeks when they changed a diaper, they had to search for the appearance of said worm emerging from his child’s bowels, and then pull the worm the rest of the way out. (I really hope you aren’t eating right now.) As the author described it: “it’s a damn horror show.” That’s pretty much what played through my head and provided some tiny bit of comfort as I drove home from the pediatrician. I may have to rip tissue out of my sweet daughter’s hand, but at least I’m not pulling a worm from her butt.

That night, as I placed regular gauze on her hand I couldn’t help but shed a few tears. My dear girl had been so brave, so long-suffering and upbeat through this whole ordeal and still had a ways to go. I was so proud of her. How could I possibly inflict more pain on her?

Happily, this gauze treatment has been relatively smooth sailing. We have to get pretty creative with ways to get her hand wet, since she still doesn’t like doing that, but she has tolerated the bandage changing like a true gem and it looks like we’re making progress. Hopefully a couple more weeks and everything will be back to normal.

So, let’s recap what we’ve learned here:

1. Treadmills and young children do not mix. AT ALL.

2. Don’t put regular gauze on an open and oozing wound immediately after it happening unless you want to make the situation 100 times worse.

3. Dora The Explorer band-aids, in fact, DO make the owie feel a little better. So do popsicles.

4. Being a kid is tough. Being a parent is tough. But we’re all stronger than we think we are.

As for the good news…well, this post is long enough, don’t you think? That will have to wait for another day

A conundrum

Rachel — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 18:06:51 +0000

I try to stay pretty on top of things as far as my daughter’s health and well-being go. As with most new aspects of motherhood though, I was pretty clueless how to go about caring for her. When does she eat solid foods? When she stops drinking formula, what on earth do I feed her all day? How on earth do I clip these tiny fingernails? How many naps should she be taking? How much tummy time is enough?

Each new stage brought new questions. At some point after her teeth started coming in, I realized they wouldn’t just keep themselves healthy. Do I have to like, CLEAN these things??

I remember reading in a parenting magazine that once there are two teeth that touch, parents should floss their kids’ teeth daily.

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Have they met a baby? Better yet, have they ever met a TODDLER?

Needless to say, the flossing isn’t exactly going as the professionals recommend it should. However, we have tried to be pretty diligent about brushing my daughter’s teeth. She’s gone through phases of loving it and not loving it so much, but we’ve almost always been successful by making it a game or showing how daddy does it or something along those lines. Lately though, she will have none of it. If we even start to walk into the bathroom to brush her teeth she’ll flail and flop and fuss. When we try to actually put the toothbrush in her mouth it turns into a full-on meltdown. Some nights we give up and just let her “brush” her own teeth. Other nights we beg and try to make it fun. Last night my husband just held her arms while I tried to brush her little teeth as fast as my hand would go. Not pretty.

So now what? I’m hoping this is just a phase. I don’t want to give up brushing her teeth, because dental care is important. I want to establish healthy habits with her, and if I just give up because she puts up a fuss that will set a precedent for future tooth brushing and other issues I’m sure.

As a sidenote, some may argue that dental health doesn’t matter for little kids because they will just lose their teeth anyway. However, that isn’t true. If kids teeth rot and fall out too early, it could damage the development of their permanent teeth as well as their placement and overall health. Not to mention the importance of gum health, which they will carry all their lives.

So how do you get your toddlers to brush their teeth? Do you floss your kids’ teeth? If so, HOW? (I’m guessing you must be magic to get them to hold still!) What is your philosophy on the whole thing anyway? Advice is welcome.

Toddler fatigue

Rachel — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 02:33:10 +0000

I’m beginning to realize more fully every day that I am completely unprepared to parent a toddler. I would probably say that, oh, 99% of people would probably make the same comment, but that doesn’t make me feel any better knowing that I’m in good company.

Surviving the infancy of my daughter was hard. The lack of sleep, the lack of freedom as you are homebound with a tiny and helpless human. The never ending cycle of a new baby- eat, poop, sleep, cry, eat, poop, sleep, cry…But, infants do sleep a lot. And if they aren’t sleeping, they’re usually pretty content if they’re held or being fed. They don’t move much, they don’t need much entertainment, and they eat the same thing all the time. So simple!

Surviving toddler-hood may prove impossible. When my daughter was about 4 months old we could tell she would be an extremely active baby and little girl by the way she would wildly pump her arms and legs on a regular basis. Our prediction was spot-on. My now 15 month old never stops moving. She is always exploring something. She likes lot of action and entertainment. She is a smart and sweet little thing. But she has an uncanny way of driving me truly crazy.

Not only does she still not sleep and lately she still poops 4 frickin’ times a day, but the ever-changing eating habits, the need to be constantly on the move, and the frequent whining/groaning/grunting/screeching jags due to boredom or teething pain or who knows what has me exhausted and feeling as though I am on the edge of losing it. I have a complete understanding of the phrase bone tired. And the stubbornness! Oh, the stubbornness!

I know these years are precious, and in many ways I do love them. But some days I wonder how on earth I am going to survive another day (or night) like the one I just endured.