CONFESSION: LONG before I had a blog..I was a blog reader. Not sure what it is, but I just like to read blogs. There are blogs that I read daily and I've never met the people who write them and probably never will. Weird, huh? Maybe it's a girl thing b/c Duke thinks it's nuts. :)
Thinking about my favorite blogs, all of them are very real. Real in the way that these women all tell it EXACTLY like it is. NO sugar coating, NO air brushing of photos...just REAL moments in their lives no matter how crazy. I always hoped that if I ever decided to start a blog, that's how mine would be. Just real..no matter how good or bad. So in attempt to try and live up to my own hopes for this thing, let me tell you why I won't be winning the Mother of the Year award this year.
Last Tuesday, Addison woke up with a fever and I decide to give her some Tylenol. I managed to make it down the stairs with her on one hip, Bambi, her shoes, blanket and juice cup in the other hand and proceeded to the cabinet in the kitchen. Addison was pitching a fit that she wanted to "help" me pour out the Tylenol so I sat her on the counter to try and make this as "mess-free" as possible. Lucky me, that before we ever got to the pouring part, she spotted something else to occupy her time. Unlucky for me, that it was a bottle of Teething tablets from her teething days.
Just in case you don't know what teething tablets are, they are homeopathic pills that help when babies are teething. Addison was shaking the bottle and pretending it was a rattle for her baby doll and for a moment...things were good. About this time, in walks Duke from work, Addison takes the Tylenol (of course not without a struggle) and gets down to run to Dad and greet him with a hug. Addison then went into the playroom, Duke and I talked about his day, I ran to put clothes in the dryer and Duke yelled up that he was running to the bank. I came downstairs (minutes...and I do mean MINUTES) later and was greeted by Addison who handed me an EMPTY bottle of teething tablets and sweetly said, "I ate them Mommy!" WHAT?!?!?! Seriously??? You fought me to take 1 tsp. of Bubble gum flavored Tylenol and you just ate a bottle of teething tablets?? I asked her again if she was sure and she replied with a, "Yeah!" Like it was no big deal! She then proceeded to stick out her tongue so I could still see that it was still white from the pills. I asked her if they tasted good...and I still got a "Yeah!" Good to know, huh?
Needless to say, I would have preferred to have NOT been alone at this moment. I freaked out and tried to think back to anything I had ever read about children and pill swallowing and then it dawned on me that I didn't know much about this b/c I didn't ever think I would be the type of mother these things happened to! What type of Mom lets their child eat pills?!?
Here's two more things I learned in that 60 sec time frame: A). I don't know the number to poison control (I do now!) and B). You can't call 411 and get the number for poison control...it connected me to a dentist.
So I called 911 and tried to stay calm while I explained to the nice lady on the other end of the line that my child had just eaten a bottle of pills and I swear I'm not an irresponsible parent. Talk about feeling like a loser! She connected me to poison control and I answered another round of questions from another lady and secretly prayed she wasn't sending DCFS out to my house as we spoke.
Just for future reference, a child can eat an entire bottle of teething tablets and still be fine. According to poison control, there is a very small amount of the active ingredient in them so Addison was going to be fine. Me on the other hand, I felt like I needed to take a responsible parenting class.
So...that is why I won't be winning any awards for my parenting skills this year and this might just knock me out of the running for a few years.
How's that for being real???
