so rob taught mimi to shake off bumps and bruises with a flippant "it's okay." and really most scrapes are 'okay' and mimi can shake it off and move forward, but she doesnt understand when it's not okay. today, as we headed to swim class, i opened the door to the RECenter and when i did, the door hit mimi's toe. she had this horrified shocked look on her face and i said, oh my gosh, are you okay? and mimi, smiles shakily at me and bravely says, "it's okay, right mom?" i look at her toe and don't see anything immediately wrong, so we go to swim class.
by the end of the 30 minute class mimi is sobbing and sobbing but can't seem to tell us what is wrong. i assume she is upset with not being able to put her head underwater completely. we get home and she says to me. "mom, see my peg leg?" and she hobbles over to me, barely putting weight on her right foot. "i mean my peg toe!" she corrects herself and holds her foot out for me to see. thinking she was pretending to be a pirate, i smilingly play along with her..."arrr me 'arties. shiver me timbers! holy crap! what happened to your toe!!!"
and there's this bloody stump staring at me with the top half of the skin flapping open. it looks worse than i think it is. i dont think it needs stitches. it's hard to tell because she wont let me touch it with a ten foot pole. she let me put a mountain of neosporin on it but i was not allowed to spread it on. i'll give the neosporin a chance to work and then press the skin back down in a few minutes.
it doesnt seem like a good idea to teach her to be so flippant about every hurt and maybe she is not old enough to really know when a hurt is serious enough to need attention and when a hurt can heal up without any intervention and should just be brushed off. i dont want to teach her to ignore what her body tells her...if it hurts, dammit, i want her to tell me, not brush it off and ignore it. some children DIE from making these decisions on their own. when i was teaching, there was a kindergartener who didnt tell her parents how bad she felt and went to school. midway thru the day, it was clear to the teacher the child wasnt well, so the parents were called and the child was sent home. the parents didnt think anything of it. the next morning the school received a call that the child had died that night.
it's a fine line to draw i guess. mimi will let a tiny scrape debilitate her, and rob got her to move forward by brushing it off with an easy "it's okay." but i dont think she understands when it is more serious she needs to tell an adult and not think that "it's okay" and be worried about telling us. i guess she thought she should just tell me in a joking way (see my peg toe?) b/c she thought i might get mad at her if she gave in to the pain and cried???
after i put the meds on her toe, she let loose a dam of emotion and cried HARD. crying has pain management benefits, so i held her and let her get that emotion out. i wanted so badly to be able to latch her onto my boobs and nurse her pain away the way i did for her when she was little (nursing helps alleviate pain for babies) and it made me feel so helpless that there was so little i could do for her to help her with her pain.
her toe looks a mess. i'll have to keep an eye on it and hope it is not too serious.
by the end of the 30 minute class mimi is sobbing and sobbing but can't seem to tell us what is wrong. i assume she is upset with not being able to put her head underwater completely. we get home and she says to me. "mom, see my peg leg?" and she hobbles over to me, barely putting weight on her right foot. "i mean my peg toe!" she corrects herself and holds her foot out for me to see. thinking she was pretending to be a pirate, i smilingly play along with her..."arrr me 'arties. shiver me timbers! holy crap! what happened to your toe!!!"
and there's this bloody stump staring at me with the top half of the skin flapping open. it looks worse than i think it is. i dont think it needs stitches. it's hard to tell because she wont let me touch it with a ten foot pole. she let me put a mountain of neosporin on it but i was not allowed to spread it on. i'll give the neosporin a chance to work and then press the skin back down in a few minutes.
it doesnt seem like a good idea to teach her to be so flippant about every hurt and maybe she is not old enough to really know when a hurt is serious enough to need attention and when a hurt can heal up without any intervention and should just be brushed off. i dont want to teach her to ignore what her body tells her...if it hurts, dammit, i want her to tell me, not brush it off and ignore it. some children DIE from making these decisions on their own. when i was teaching, there was a kindergartener who didnt tell her parents how bad she felt and went to school. midway thru the day, it was clear to the teacher the child wasnt well, so the parents were called and the child was sent home. the parents didnt think anything of it. the next morning the school received a call that the child had died that night.
it's a fine line to draw i guess. mimi will let a tiny scrape debilitate her, and rob got her to move forward by brushing it off with an easy "it's okay." but i dont think she understands when it is more serious she needs to tell an adult and not think that "it's okay" and be worried about telling us. i guess she thought she should just tell me in a joking way (see my peg toe?) b/c she thought i might get mad at her if she gave in to the pain and cried???
after i put the meds on her toe, she let loose a dam of emotion and cried HARD. crying has pain management benefits, so i held her and let her get that emotion out. i wanted so badly to be able to latch her onto my boobs and nurse her pain away the way i did for her when she was little (nursing helps alleviate pain for babies) and it made me feel so helpless that there was so little i could do for her to help her with her pain.
her toe looks a mess. i'll have to keep an eye on it and hope it is not too serious.
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