finally Mom

Apparently, I'm human. And shit happens to humans- quite often, really.

Yesterday after dinner, Lovie and I were playing a bit before her bedtime. As I sat on the couch, I snatched her up and into my arms and started giving her a million kisses and nomming on her cheeks and neck as she squealed in delight. She wiggled herself free of my lock and started doing her little sing and dance routine as she jumped up and down and held onto the back of the couch. "You're so silly," I said watching on and laughing. Then she moved ever so quickly and stood by the edge of the couch that would normally meet with the other part of the couch/sectional, but we had a Superbowl Poker party a couple weeks back and in order to turn the tv in a manner so the folk playing cards could see, we had to push the one part of the section back, thereby leaving a part of the couch without a backing...

I'm sure you can see where this is going. Le Sigh.

She stood at the part where the backing disappears and smiled at me and laughed as she continued with her sing and dance. I laughed along with her and stood up to grab her because she was being goofy and moving so fast.

It all happened so quickly, yet I saw everything as if it was in slow motion.

As I got up, she started to fall. The smile from her face instantly disappeared. I wanted to pick the couch up that I was sitting on and whip it over my head and dive down onto the floor to catch her... but I couldn't. There was no time and I'm not superhuman enough to do such a thing.

back of the back of the couch

I ran around the couch to the back and saw that her arms hit first, sort of blocking her head. I waited for the big THUMP as her head hit the hardwood floor (you know, because the fucking carpet is in front of the couch, not behind- argh) but it wasn't as loud as I had anticipated.

Without thinking much about it, I scooped her up as she started screaming (and in hindsight am wondering if I should've let her be and let her get up on her own... isn't that what happens in the movies when someone falls? don't they make them lay still??!) and clutched onto her for dear life. I just held her to me and told her it was OK over and over again as she screamed.

I paced the floor holding her and she never felt so light. She was stuck on me and clutching onto me just as much as I was her. I wanted to scream and cry but instead I told her it would be OK and inside I literally begged that she be OK.

"I'm so sorry, honey," I whispered.

I walked to her bedroom to find her baby doll and once she saw it she clutched onto it and then buried herself back into me... I knew she wasn't bleeding or anything of the sort; I knew the fall wasn't horrifically bad or damaging; but it would've been super duper awesome to make sure... but she wasn't ready and I just held her until she was as I took a seat in my chair next to her crib.

Honestly, the crying lasted all of three or four minutes from the time she fell until she stopped. And when she stopped she looked at me without a tear in her eye, and I told her again how sorry I was...

obv not taken last night (from this past weekend)

...and those eyes just looked at me for a second as if she were assessing if I was telling the truth or something!


Then she slid down off of me with her baby doll, looked at the shelf and grabbed her/our favorite book and gave it to me to read. As far as I could tell there was no blood and no bruises so I scooped her back up and she laid on me while I read and she turned the pages. Then she wanted to play with her shape sorter so we did that for a few minutes before she slid her way back into my lap. She was so tired and I wondered- Do I let her go to sleep? Aren't you supposed to keep them up after they hit their head? But I knew she was tired already before the fall since she had only had one short nap all day.

We never really watch TV with her since we only have a couple of hours a night with her during the week and we're too busy playing, eating, etc with her, but I thought I might see if she would watch some TV and just relax. She did... for about 5 minutes. Then she came back to me wanting to lay on me and that's her way of telling me she's ready for bed.

About 1/2 an hour after the fall, she went to bed very easily- but that's not abnormal for her. As soon as she laid down and I had the chance, I called the husband to let him know what happened and asked his opinion on the sleeping thing. He asked if she had vomited or anything and I told him No. He said that if I called the doctor they would tell me to bring her to the hospital and I asked if he wanted me to do that... but that I really didn't think it was necessary.

I felt awful that this happened, but, when it comes to parenting my child, I do NOT let guilt interfere with my judgement... As a (have to be) working mom, I discarded the Guilt card long ago. It was do that or be sick with guilt over working, putting her into daycare, not giving her homemade baby food, giving her frozen meatballs for dinner, etc etc etc! and I tend to listen to my gut a lot and my gut was telling me she was just fine. I reassured my husband of this and he said he trusted me and that he was sure she was fine, too.

I checked in on her a couple times before bed and made sure to turn the monitor on extra loud but she just slept on through the night like the big girl she is.  And this morning when she woke, she was all, "Hey I'm awake now" that sounds like, "Heeeeey." She's fine. We're fine. I just miss her terribly already.. and it's only been an hour since I left her at school.

And yeah, we're putting the damn sectional back together asap!


P.S. I'm not telling you this because I want pity or I want to be reassured that I'm a good mom. I know I'm a good mom. Hell, I'm not just a good mom; I'm a damn good mom. I don't need this reassurance from anyone- though it's nice to hear, I admit. But really, not the point to this post... Just wanted to share that while I know I'm a damn good mom, it doesn't mean that I don't know that I'm still human and that shit does indeed happen to all of us.