as a special treat for the little dude's birthday we took him to mc donald's for lunch. daddy met us there during his lunch break and had to go back to work when we finished eating. the little dude, baby dude, and i stuck around so that the little dude could play in the play-land for awhile. at one point the little dude came over to the table so that he could get a drink of his chocolate milk. (his
favorite) he was half-standing and half-sitting on the bench at the table. the next thing i know, he's somehow hanging upside down with his head in a pool of chocolate milk.
i'm trying to pull him up as quickly as i can because he was stuck and literally balancing on his head/neck. he was scared to death and started crying and screaming immediately. as soon as i got him up i assessed the situation. to my surprise his head was fine, but his index finger was bleeding everywhere. no sooner had i gotten him up from the floor when a man came over and asked, "do you need help? i'm an e.m.t.?) i was so relieved to see him there. i was all alone with both boys; one bleeding everywhere. i couldn't leave the baby to help the little dude, so i quickly said, "yes, that would be great."
the little dude sat on my lap while the gentleman applied pressure to his finger to help stop the bleeding and we both tried to talk to him through the screams and crying. (and when i say screams, i mean blood curdling, top of his lungs screaming, in the middle of mc donald's) he had basically cut a good layer of his skin off from his top knuckle to the top of his finger. it was not pretty. i asked him if he would like a band-aid because i know that usually makes things better. he said yes and the gentleman who was helping us said he would go up front to see if they could give him one.
while he was gone, a lady came over to see if the little dude would like some fruit snacks she had in her purse. i accepted in hopes that it would keep him from screaming if he had something in his mouth. no such luck! the gentleman came back shortly with a band-aid and had also told them to bring a mop back to clean up all the chocolate milk! he was definitely my hero of the day. we got the band-aid on and he went back to his table.
i sat the little dude down so i could get both boys ready to go. (keep in mind there is still blood-curdling screaming going on this whole time) it takes me a good 15 minutes to get both boys in their hats, mitten, coats, etc because i have to stop every 2 seconds to ask the little dude to please stop screaming. (of course it couldn't have been summer so i could just scoop them up and leave!) i felt bad because i knew it hurt, but at the same time we were in the middle of a restaurant and he had already been screaming for quite some time at this point. i finally get them both ready to go, baby in one arm, purse, left over lunch, camera, drinks, and the little dude in the other.
we made it home and washed the crusty chocolate milk out of his hair the best i could, gave him some ibuprofen and put him down for a nap. he finally managed to stop screaming a few minutes after i laid him down. it was quite the event.
i honestly don't know what i would have done if that nice man hadn't come over to help. he saved my day! i never got his name, but i thanked him several times. i'm not sure if he really realizes what his help meant to me. i'm sure in his eyes it wasn't much but, being all alone and not being able to leave one child to help another, he was absolutely my saving grace.
*photo above taken pre-incident
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