Fragile

A couple of weeks ago, we were at MJ's school to pick her up. Z wanted to walk down the stairs inside the school by himself (though usually he wants to take the elevator and push the buttons BY HIMSELF). Z was up by T, while I was a few steps above them. Then, Z tripped and fell. Oh my. Luckily, he was able to catch himself and only fell down a few stairs rather than the 10-15 to the bottom. The image of him falling head over heels and my powerlessness to do anything about it makes me quake.

He cut his lip in the fall. I grabbed him and he was spurting blood everywhere and screaming. We raced to the bathroom where I tried to apply pressure and wipe him up but he didn't want anything on his face. He just kept wailing. We ran to the car, called Andy, who was on his way home, and told him to meet us at urgent care. He was going to need stitches. As we were driving, he was very distraught. He wanted Andy. He asked me, "Why didn't you hold my hand when I was going down the stairs??" (knife to the heart). MJ kept saying, "It's OK." His response: "It's NOT OK!" I told T, the jokester in the family, to help him feel better, but all he could say was, "I can't look at it! I can't look at it!" Finally, he started talking to Z while looking the other way.

We got to urgent care and checked in, but as soon as the nurse saw how deeply his lip was cut, she told us that we should go to the ER where he would have to be sedated. By then, Andy had met up with us, and Z was calmer. He kept asking for a Sesame Street book, but we had to settle for an Elmo sticker.

Andy ended up taking him to the ER, and I went home with MJ and T. It took them a long time at the ER, and they didn't inform them that he couldn't be sedated if he had eaten. Of course they're going to eat, since it's 7:30 at night. So, by the time they finally got into a room and were seen by a doctor, they had to do the fish hook stitches without sedation anyway. They also didn't have to use the papoose to strap him down. He did great and they finally made it home by 10:15.

Watching my child tumble down the stairs, I felt the shock of how fragile life is. I focus on getting through the days and weeks, making sure homework is done, taking care of responsibilities, but in an instant, that illusion of stability and predictability could be shot to hell. I just kept thinking that it's amazing that we've made it this far without any major accident, illness, or other disaster (the Japanese tragedy has also been weighing on me). I felt really emotional about it for quite a while afterward.

Fun fact that we learned in this whole process: lips are made of a similar material as guts. They completely regenerate themself over a short period of time. We were amazed at how fast his lip healed up. Five to six days later, you could scarcely tell anything had happened.