Riley's Boo Boo!

We experienced big boo boo #2 Friday morning. Kelly and I left at the same time - him to drop Riley off, me to run to buy a card and present for someone on my team moving to California. While I perusing for just the right card - I get a call from The Sloan School. They have a very strict policy about telling you anytime your toddler bumps their head due to the nature of concussions in toddlers. Sometimes the symptoms of a bump on the head in the morning won't manifest until that evening, and it's dangerous b/c they can come across as tired and wanting to go to bed then just not wake up! Scary! 

Anyway...to say I'm used to getting the "Riley's okay! He just got a bump on the noggin' doing X, Y or Z" call at least every other week would be an understatement! But this time was different! Michele said he had fell running and busted his lip pretty bad, bad enough that they felt I needed to come take him to the dr. So I grabbed the card I had in my hand and made my way to Sloan to get my little man! 

On the way there, I called Kelly to tell him. And it made me recall the first time Riley busted his lip. It was last year maybe...and he somehow did it on a can in our pantry, and of course Kelly wasn't home! I told Kelly I was going to get there to pick Riley up at school today, and the cut wasn't going to be as bad as that one! And I DIDN'T take him to the dr that time! :( Bad Mommy! 

The First Boo Boo from a year or so ago.

He still has a little "character" scar from this one, but you can only see it in perfect sunlight. Bless him! We were both a mess and covered in LOTS of blood that day! 

Anyway - I get to school...and it was what I thought! It didn't "appear" to be as bad as this one..there definitely wasn't as much blood shed, but it was already swollen and puffy so it was hard to tell. He was such a big, strong boy too! When he saw me he almost started crying just because he saw me...then he just went right into telling me the story of how it all went down.

Mommy, I was running and I fell in the Home Center area and cut my lip on the sharp clothes rack. Just nonchalant as could be! Michele from the school said he was totally calm about it - held ice on it and told her how it happened..then agreed he should go have the dr take a look at it! That was until I said specifically Dr. Jim! Then he had a quick change of heart!

Anyway, Riley wanted Daddy so we called Kelly to meet us at Dr. Jim's so we could get it checked out. Dr. Jim said it was our call, but our options were a bit of a scar which will probably ultimately heal, or take him to a plastic surgeon for somewhere between 5-10 itty bitty plastic surgery stitches. Of course, Kelly quickly said I could go by myself! He's a BIG guy that's scared to death of needles so anything requiring that-I'm on my own! Dr. Jim said they wouldn't put him out, but they'd strap him down in this papoose thing that would hold his head, shoulders, and arms down so they could stitch him up. He said since the cut goes across the outline of the lip, and it was already swollen - like the one above pretty much - it would require plastic surgery closure to ensure there wouldn't be a dimple or a bad alignment that could ultimately make his lip line crooked. 

Kelly said - he's a boy! Scars are cool! So we opted for the "boy scar"! I figured what do I know..I'm the Mom! And the thought of him being strapped down didn't appeal much to me either! 

Kelly stayed with Riley at home so I could go to the going away lunch and take the gifts, then I came and worked from home for the afternoon. Riley pretty much slept most of the afternoon though and didn't eat much the rest of the day. Bless his little heart! And when the Motrin wore off - he was a little terror so you could tell he didn't feel good! He was still in a little pain Saturday am, but then GiGi got here to play with him so Kelly could take me out for my upcoming birthday and he was fully healed and ready for some GiGi play time!

He seems to be mostly better today (Sunday), but now we're just trying to keep it moist so it won't dry out and start to crack and hurt him again. 


One of our friend's little girls that is almost a year younger than Riley already had to get stitches a few weeks ago, so on one hand I feel lucky we've already made it this far! On the other - I'd be fine with him being like me and Kelly and not having stitches until he's old like us! :) Kelly's had 1 stitch in his life and I've had none! Knock on wood!

In the car on the way to see Dr. Jim :(

Waiting to see Dr. Jim

This is blurry, but you can see how it was already pretty puffed up which makes the alignment difficult.

Saturday AM

As you can tell - he's not a happy camper that Mommy's trying to take pictures of it! One day he'll be able to brag how TOUGH he was though!

Boo Boos!!!

So I was blogging today and saw this post way down on my list. I guess I saved it so I could upload the pic later, then forgot! Better late than never on capturing Riley's first boo boo!

Man on man! Riley got his 1st pretty big "boo boo" last Saturday (Jan 9th). Of course, while Kelly was gone! I actually handled it pretty well considering all the blood, but it was like the longer it went on the more I lost it!

In the end, it probably wasn't *that* big of a deal! I'm not even sure how he did it. I have a hypothesis, but I didn't see it happen so I can't be sure. Basically, he was getting his juice bottle out of the pantry, and my guess is that as he pulled the juice bottle off the shelf and it went to fall to the floor - he was still trying to hold it and it hit one of the shelves on the door and popped him in the lip.

Unfortunately, I was cutting up his snack so I was focused on not cutting my own fingers off and missed all the action! When I turned around he was screaming and it looked like he was coughing chunks of blood out of his mouth.

I picked him up, but I couldn't see ANYTHING for all the blood gushing out. I took a kitchen towel and tried to apply pressure to his mouth, but as soon as I would pull the towel away again - blood gushing. And as he coughed from crying so hard more what appeared to be chunks of blood. I had no idea if his tooth had gone through his skin, if teeth had been knocked out or broken! It was a little crazy for a second!

Finally, I got him calmed down and tried to assess the damage. It looked like a boxer's eye cut, but it was right by his lip. There were actually 2 of them with the top one being the worst. I had to take pictures of it and send them to my Mom's phone so she could help me assess the damage and decide whether it warranted stitches or not. In the end, it began to close on it's own, and we decided holding him down for stitches would actually be more traumatic than having a little character scar!

Wow though! I'm totally not ready for this "rough and tumble" boy stuff!! Knock on wood, but Kelly and I neither one have had stitches or broken bones! I'm thinking based on Riley's activity level up to this point - that story may change with him! It remains to be seen!

Here's the pic I sent to my Mom for assessment after we finally got the bleeding to stop.



All this commotion made me realize we need a 1st aid kit! We don't even have band-aids! Luckily, I at least had Neosporin!

Walking Disaster and Emotional Roller Coaster!

More and more Riley is becoming a walking disaster! This morning for instance! It was like a 3 Stooges episode in the span of 3 minutes while I was getting dressed for work. He closed his own hand in the door (not realizing when he was pulling on one side that he was in fact squishing his fingers on the other side)! We recovered from that, then he went right back to the same door and pulled it into his head. We recovered from that, and I sat him on the counter for 2 seconds while I put on my jewelry and he slide backwards into the sink! Which I think scared him for the split second he felt like he was "free falling".

And he goes from zero to SCREAMING SO LOUD YOUR BRAIN HURTS!!!! in like .2 seconds!! OMG! He's totally in the toddler emotional roller coaster ride years! He can go from happy and laughing to screaming in the SAME breath!

He comes to me with his hands up so I'll pick him up, then he leans over like he wants back down. If I put him down, he immediately sprawls out on his stomach with his head on the floor and screams like I just spanked him or something! Wowzer!

All these new emotions!! And he's just not sure what to do with them!! He doesn't have issues "expressing" them though! That's for sure!!

Diaper changes have become more like WWF and let me see what sad pathetic attempt Mom or Dad can come up with to try to distract me this time events!!

Oh yeah! And now any and everything within arms reach has the potential to be a projectile weapon! Seriously!! There have been 2 instances where I SWORE I was going to have a black eye!! This is a tough one! It started out that he was throwing blocks, so we put the blocks away but now he'll pretty much throw ANYTHING!!! Especially whatever device you *think* you are going to distract him with during the diaper change!

Yesterday morning I walked in his room and he had literally thrown everything out of his crib except 2 things! And I mean THROW! Not dropped over the side!! And every night when I leave his room, things get thrown at the door after I close it!

It's like overnight he's channeled his inner Nolan Ryan!! Before he would "wind up", then just drop whatever it was he was holding. Or he would bring his basketball toward you, then drop it behind his own head. He doesn't throw the basketball b/c it's too big, but anything that fits in the palm of his hand is now classified as a level 2 projectile weapon! Beware!!