To Not Feel Guilty

Last night, when she should have been asleep, I heard my youngest daughter in her bathroom where she knocked something on to the floor.  I asked if she was okay and she said that she needed me to come in there.  I did.  On my way in, I saw a trail of blood on the floor going from her bedroom to the bathroom.  I looked at the puncture in her leg and had her apply pressure to it – she has just been trying to wipe up the blood which was pouring out of the wound.  I asked what happened.  She said that she thought that she’d put away her clay knife (which is an exacto knife) after using it earlier but she obviously didn’t.  She rolled over onto it and it sliced into her thigh.

I kept checking the bleeding which stopped upon applying pressure.  I had to corral the dog so he’d stop licking up the blood (EWWW!).  I had to clean up the floors in the bedroom, hall, and bathroom.  Then I had to convince my daughter to rinse/wash off her bloody leg and foot.

As soon as I got the bleeding to stop, I tried calling friends who live in the neighborhood because I needed emotional support and, possibly, help with the mess.  I didn’t leave messages and didn’t think about my ringer being turned off so when they called me back or texted, I didn’t know.  Thankfully, one of them knows me well enough to know that if I call that late, something is wrong so she came right over.  She helped get my daughter calmed down, cleaned up, and bandaged.  (A pre-teen is MUCH more likely to listen to an adult friend/neighbor before her mother.)

Once everything was taken care of, my daughter was bandaged and put to bed, and my neighbor went home, I fell apart.  That is what I do.  I am GREAT during an emergency.  Afterward, though, is a different story.

I cried like I hadn’t cried in quite a while.  I couldn’t figure out why I was crying.  I didn’t have anything to do with her getting hurt other than not making her clean her room (a fight I didn’t like when I was the one being yelled at and argued with to clean MY room and, for the most part, I have chosen to not have that argument with her; I have other ways of dealing with her messy room, but that’s another post).  I know that I was hurting because she was hurt.  She did not cry about any pain; she did cry about it being her “fault” that it happened.  I felt guilty – of what, I don’t know.  I felt sad.  I felt angry.  I felt defeated.  I felt lonely (my husband – her father – works out-of-state so I am a “single parent” more often than not).  I was grateful that my friend came right over to check on me and was able to help.  Whenever I’d start to calm down (or fall asleep the rest of the night), I’d see the gash in my daughter’s leg and the blood all over the place and get upset all over again.

My daughter got up this morning and was fine.  Her gash did not bleed during the night (I knew that because I checked on her several times during the night).  She was walking around normally, although she was a little stiff at first.  She went to summer camp today and was fine.  She seems to be back to normal.

Me?  That’s a different story.  I will be okay, but it will take a while.