Fat Hand and Advice for New Moms

Last night Tayte woke up about 3:00 am screaming his head off. He was just sobbing. I had never seen him like that. Especially in the middle of the night.

I finally thought to ask him what hurt. Duh. Genius mother of five here. He said his hand hurt. When I picked it up to look at it he screamed more and I realized it was hot to the touch. It was also swollen. He was hollering for his Daddy so I went and woke The Coach. (More on this later.)

We studied it and looked at it with a flashlight. We could find any bug bites. I was terrified he had gotten bitten by something he was allergic too. I recently read a post by a mom with a kid who is allergic to ants. He had a near death experience so I was busy monitoring Tayte's breathing. I came to the conclusion that if a kid can scream loud enough to wake the dead, and Shaye Baby - he can breath. He couldn't move it real well, but that was partly because it was so swollen. I did remember that he had a hard fall at the playground earlier in the evening. I ignored it at the time because that is how I deal with injuries to avoid drama. Don't judge me I am not the only one.

The flashlight finally distracted him enough from the pain to get him to calm down. (If you are ever looking for a gift for a boy age 3-6 a FLASHLIGHT is a sure bet. No, that is not the advice.)
He went and got in bed with The Coach. That will mark the first time we ever let him sleep in our bed in his three years on earth. I slept on the couch and I could hear him in there talking and whimpering intermittently.

The Coach is one of those guys who hear nothing while he is sleeping. I tried to assume this was just a male defense mechanism and that he was just pretending not to hear. This is not the case. He will get up with whatever kid needs it if I tap him lightly. And then shake him violently, then get out the bull horn and yell, "It's a pick-off!" I have tried yelling other things like, "Fire!!" but they yield no reaction. If I yell "It's a pick-off", he springs out of bed hollering, "BACK!!!!" to the top of his lungs. The good side to this is that he never really knows if it is his turn or not so he will go to the kids every time I wake him. Not that a sweet wife like me would ever take advantage of that, especially if the floor might be cold. The bad part is that once I have found the bullhorn and put batteries in it and doused him with water and everything I might as well just tend the the hollering kid myself.

So here is the advice to young moms. Teach your children to call for their dad in the middle of the night. Sure it is nice to hear, "Momma" and know you are the only one who can fix whatever is wrong, but it is even nicer to get a full night of sleep. I am not a good mom from the hours of midnight to 5am. My older kids are quite aware of this. So I started teaching them at a young age to yell, "Daddy!" (Unless the problem is throw up. The Coach can't handle throw up and I would rather just clean up one kid's mess than and kid's and The Coach's.)

This is why The Coach wound up in bed with a whining hot, sweaty, slightly snotty almost three year old who loves his daddy and I got a couch all by my little self.

Here's how. First go ahead and teach your baby to say, "Daddy" first. It is easier for them to say and it will make your husband feel good. Plus it will be their only option in the middle of the night. Then when they get older if it seems like it might be a rough night when you put them to bed say, "If you need anything call for your Daddy." I did all this on the down low, but the secret is out now since my husband reads this blog. (And as I recently discovered he reads some of yours as well.) Pretty soon it will become a nighttime habit. (I am sorry if your husband has to go out of town a lot. I have no solution for that.)

There that is the best advice I can give new moms. That really isn't true. I had lots of advice on feeding, sleeping, potty training, and teaching Latin. But no one likes a know it all, so I'll just keep quiet. (Just kidding about the Latin.) (Ok. Kidding about all of it. I got nothing.)

P.S. Tayte is going to the doctor this morning for a hand assessment. I don't know if this kind of thing warrants a doctor appointment, but The Coach is taking him anyway.