O’s First Accident

He and she had been lucky with O. Ever since he was 2 months old, he slept through the night. When he was 3 months or so, they began practicing co-sleeping, which means the baby sleeping in the bed with them. It worked without fail for about 7 1/2-8 months or so.

O was about 9 months old, rapidly approaching 10 months when he figured out how to pull himself up on things like the couch or to the ledge of his pack and play. In the new house, the trio stayed in the basement bedroom, floored with tile while they renovated their bedroom on the main floor.

One night, mid-February 2016, he, she, and O went to bed around 9pm. At around 11:30pm they were awoken by a sound that made he and she jump from the bed. After a few instances, the silence was broken with wails from O, who was on the basement floor on dad’s side of the bed. He scooped O up in his arms as they both made panicked glances at each other unsure of what to do. Terror filled the room along with the loud bursts of crying coming from O, when he noticed something on his shirt. “Is this from earlier?” he asked her, referring to when he had cut his finger that night preparing dinner.

“No, babe… that’s wet still.” She said as they quickly pulled O away from dad’s chest to reveal O’s face that was half covered in bright red blood. She was trembling as she grabbed O from him. “Babe go upstairs and get ice and a bottle to calm him down. The blood is coming from his nose.” He quickly sprung to the tasks she set forth looking more panicked than he had initially. She was able to cease O’s crying for several minutes until he came back with the ice and the bottle. The cold was alarming to him. “Grab him and try to keep icing his nose. I am going to call the on-call nurse to see what more to do or if we should bring him to the ER.”

When the on-call nurse finally returned their call around 10 minutes after her somewhat calm voicemail, she was asked to explain the incident and the injury. The nurse assured that O must have only hit his nose somehow (their bed wasn’t that high off the ground), but to look for signs of a concussion over the next 24 hours. Other than that, he would be fine with time and may have dual black-eyes.

When all the mayhem seemed to be over, the bloody nose stopped, and O fell back to sleep, he and she looked at each other still trembling with fear for their son, unsure at whether or not to go to sleep.

“I feel so bad, this is all my fault.” He said to her.

“Babe, O is going to get hurt. We need to start putting him in the pack and play from now on to sleep, but it is not your fault. Just think, we are going to have not one but TWO boys, who are going to hurt themselves and each other.”

“That’s true.” he said with a slight smile, noticeably changing his demeanor.

They woke up every two hours to check on O’s condition. The next morning, he was back to his smiley happy self with the addition of a black and blue mark that draped itself over the bridge of his nose like a breath-right strip. He never got a black eye from it, and within a week’s time the mark was gone. From that day on, O slept in his pack and play.

He and she learned that day more so than ever before the trials, fears, and difficulty of parenting, but the thing that comforted them most was that they had each other to turn to when crisis happened.