Confession of a scary mom

The story in this post is from this past Saturday.  A story about a day that went from sweet to scary in a matter of seconds.

The sweet

This past Saturday afternoon I took a drive to the south side of Denver to attend my friend's baby shower.  John had the day off and was able to watch Evan, so I was able to make this journey on my own.  It was held in a beautiful community center in a beautiful new neighborhood.  The pool at this community center was to die for...for families with small kids in particular.  A large zero-entry pool, with a small water slide and other fun water play things, and then an adult pool next to it.  Not your ordinary HOA pool!  The theme of the baby shower was a Teddy Bear Picnic, and thus there were teddy bears everywhere, including as part of the snacks (mini-teddy graham crackers, and gummy bears).

She is having a girl so I took the opportunity to get her something extra girly (a cute little swimsuit) since I don't get to buy things with ruffles for Evan, along with some other essentials she'd registered for.  She got a lot of cute gifts for baby, as well as some things for her.  Two books in particular got a lot of attention from those of us attending: Confessions of a Scary Mommy, and Porn for New Moms.  Of course, the latter got the most attention as it piqued our curiosity.  It's a quick read, as I managed to get through the whole thing in about 5 minutes.  It was funny (in fact, some pages were the "that is so true" kind of funny), and thus I got a few good laughs and would recommend it as a cute novelty item.  What I would need much more time to read is the Confessions book.  I had actually just read about it in my Parenting magazine.  It's a compilation of true confessions of moms, including one (that was highlighted in my magazine) about a mom who joined a gym with free daycare, and then after dropping her child in the daycare she goes to the locker room to read magazines for some alone time. lol.  I guess the book is meant for us moms to read to feel better when we're feeling like we're being a bad mom.

Little girls have the cutest swimsuit selection!

The scary

After the hour plus drive back home, I was very glad to be back to spend the rest of the evening with John and Evan.  It was about 5 o'clock and we were gonna cook on the grill for dinner so we were prepared to go outside and hang out in the backyard for the evening.  It had been a beautiful day with clear sunny skies and reasonably cool temperatures (compared to the rest of the summer heat at least).  As John was laying the blanket in the backyard, I was walking Evan out of the house.  Evan was holding onto my hands for balance, like we so often do to help him practice walking, as we walked across the back deck.  As we approached the deck stairs, I went to pick him up to carry him down the stairs, however Evan decided to try stepping down them right as I took one hand off him to pick him up.  In the flash of an eye, he slipped out of my hand and was tumbling down the stairs.  (Note: I'm having a bit of a panic as I recount this as I think it was the most horrifying moment of my life!).

The fall itself happened so fast that I do have a hard time remembering exactly what happened, how it happened, etc, but I remember feeling his hand slip out of mine and being unable to grab him before he fell.  And I remember seeing him fall forward and then flop all around as he made his way to the bottom of the steps.  I don't know what I said, but I'm sure I yelled out as it got John's attention just in time for him to see Evan landing on the flagstone patio.

We immediately called the doctor thinking we'd need to be seen right away, but they told us to start an observation period with him.  By the time John was on the phone with the doctor, Evan had already calmed down and stopped crying anyway, and seemed back to normal.  Other than the egg on his forehead. :(  So the on call nurse didn't think we needed to be seen, unless some warning signs showed up.

Thus, we took a few precautions based on the nurse's advice (no solid food for two hours, sleep in our room at night to watch out for him vomiting, and then just make sure he's acting normal otherwise).  He was really back to normal so quickly...much more quickly than I was.  I think his forehead took the brunt of the tumble when he fell forward (must have hit on a step as he flipped around). Luckily none of his limbs appeared to be injured and even though he landed on the stone patio, I think he landed on his feet/bottom.  After landing he did lay back and hit the back of his head against the stone, but we haven't seen any bruising on the back of his head.  Still head injuries worry me so much, so we were definitely watching him and his behavior.

I still can't stress how quickly it all happened (and thus how surreal it all seemed at the time too) and now John and I are both much more worried about him falling in other every day situations.  However, he's so interested in spending time on two feet, standing or walking, and he can so easily slip in so many situations.  He even started climbing on top of things this weekend now too...so we're really in for it!  We're really starting to wish he was still just crawling!  Nonetheless, my heart still skips a beat every time I think back to the fall on Saturday, and I do find myself replaying it in order to try to figure out how it happened (so that I can make sure it doesn't happen again!).  I know there will be bumps and bruises and slips and falls as they grow up, but ....you know, I'm not sure what to say for the but.  I guess even though I know it will happen as kids grow up, I'm still just not ready for it.  And until I am able to forgive myself for letting this fall happen, I can't help but feel like a bad mom...dare I say scary?  There is my confession for the day.