First Aiding at 2:22 AM!
Yes, I fell victim to a first aid situation at 2:22 am this morning and it really sucked!
So, I had just finished up a really great movie with my husband last night and I had pushed myself to stay awake so when 11 pm hit, I was wiped out. All ready for bed, I do what I always do before I lay down, I put my chapstick on and then put my ear plugs in.
I’ve been wearing ear plugs for many many years because when I was married to my first husband, his horrendously loud ass snoring kept me up all night for the first year we were married. In one of those ‘duh’ moments, those are the kind I have, not the Oprah-inspired ‘ah-ha’ moments, one of my friends told me about her earplug wearing for the same reason and now she slept like a baby. Well, duh, why didn’t I think of that?
With my earplugs in place, I tune out the soft snoring my husband does as well as the other distracting noises that alert my ADHD that something is up, though it may be absolutely nothing. Yes, I rely on my husband to decipher dangerous sounds from house creaking normal ones.
I was asleep and all snuggled in my bed with my human teddy bear snuggled behind me when a knock was heard by my husband at the door, I did not hear this for duh reasons.
There is a ‘button’ if you will, on my body that has many uses. My boobs for my husband are to get my attention when one or both is visited by his hand or hands and a few more purposes I will not go into detail here.
So, when my ‘button’ was grabbed, I knew something was up, I took out one earplug and mumbled a what, and then I heard the knock.
Now, because of the divorce decree that is set with my husband and his ex, his kids have been with their mother for about a month. So, the only kids in the house are mine right now meaning, I had to answer the door at, oh good lord, it’s freaking 2:22 am. That’s got to be some sort of weird omen.
I crack the door open to see my worried daughter and she tells me that we may have to go to the emergency room because her brother has cut his hand open with one of his knives. I tell her I’ll be there in a minute, as I go to put some pants on.
Here’s the scene when I open my bedroom door, all three dogs (I have my mom’s dog too) are running around like it’s really 2:22 pm and not am. My daughter is in the kitchen making food, or so it smelled, all the lights are on, and I hear my moaning son in the back bathroom. Confused, like I was in the twilight zone because surely everyone should be asleep this early, I make my way back to the moaning and find my son with his butt sitting on the closed toilet seat, his head laid down on the side of the sink, the garbage can next to him for barfing, and his hand streaming blood from his palm under the running faucet. Good God, what in the hell is going on here and again, at 2:22 am?
When I ask what the hell happened, my daughter tells me that my son was playing around with a very sharp knife of his and a plastic Mt.Dew bottle stabbing it when he missed the bottle and pierced his palm. My immediate thought was, “Huh, kinda like Jesus,” although Jesus was pierced in the wrists because the human hand could not have held His body weight on the cross. Anyway, this is where my mind goes this early in the damn morning with my son bleeding out his hand.
My son is not good AT ALL with things like this. He has a tremendous phobia to needles, stitches, blood, hospitals, etc., though it has gotten a bit better over the years. I think the beginning cause of it was when he had to go into emergency surgery at 5 weeks old because of pyloric stenosis, which is the narrowing of the opening of the stomach into the intestines. It makes the breast milk you have just sat patiently feeding to your baby to shoot out like the Exorcist. If untreated, of course, the child starves to death.
He also had to be papoosed for stitches in his eyebrow from hitting the coffee table and I thought the kids was going to just die from the struggle, thrashing, tears, and the screaming he did. So, I kinda get why he has a bit of a phobia.
On with the story . . .
My first order of business was to get the bleeding to stop with pressure from a towel for several minutes all the while my pale son and little sister assistant watched me. Once I got the bleeding to stop, established there was no tendon damage, I could think a bit. I looked at the both of them and asked, “Um, why in the hell are y’all up this late? Does this type of nightlife happen every night? What the hell you two?”
My daughter and son explain to me that since it’s summer, they stay up most of the night and sleep most of the day leaving a window in the afternoon for fun and friends.
“Oh, so this hedonistic behavior is normal for you two? This can’t be healthy AT ALL, Y’ALL! And obviously poor decisions are being made from knives to eating so late that it will turn into fat.”
I was shocked that I was unaware this was going on at night while I slept soundly in my bed. I dared asked if they leave the house at all and they were quick to say no that they knew better and if they got caught, that the wrath of hell would come after them in the form of me.
“Well, what a relief you two stay up all night, slice your hand open, eat all night, and make bad choices, at least my wrath of hell keeps you indoors.”
Once I had my son’s hand cleaned, glued shut, covered, and wrapped, he decided that a cool bath would help his clammy self so my little assistant ran a lukewarm/cold bath for him and once full, he promptly climbed in with his shorts still on as well as his socks. The kid had lost his marbles.
Getting everything settled with him and giving instruction on wringing out his shorts and socks and laying them over the hamper, I went back to bed and dreamed of knives, stitches, tendon injuries, and midnight snacking. Great sleep, NOT!
Things are so different when I was their age. Meals were 3 times per day at a set time over the summer, bed times were set in stone even in the summer, and if you ate past 7 pm at my house, you’d be the size of a whale the next day, we were told or at least made to believe. We also each had our own pocket knife but had the sense, sorry son, not to mindlessly stab empty bottles while holding them in our hands.
Does this make me a bad mom? Maybe, but I’d like to think parenting is evolving especially when you throw in a double whammy divorce blending situation. I will say that when they told me that they knew they’d have hell to pay if they went out at that time of night, I felt a bit better, but I’m also not an idiot . . . but seriously if any of y’all see them roaming at 2:22 am, call the damn police and tell them you’ve seen them rob a house so the shit will get scared out of them and maybe buy me a few more minutes of precious sleep.
Being married is a roller coaster in and of itself, having kids is the upside down kind of roller coaster, divorcing is the roller coaster that you go on that makes you barf, but remarrying and blending is the mother of all roller coasters . . . backwards, upside down, and dangling. It’s quite the ride but I love every minute of it!
Love y’all!! ♥
