The difference between E and F

So I knew having a boy would be different than having a girl. E was always fairly easy to entertain and keep safe from the hazards around the house. I never even really had to baby-proof much for her. She learned early not to touch the stove, open cabinets and stay out of the street. The only major injury we've had with her in five years was when she needed stitches in her head for a cut caused by the neighbor boy. I don't count that one though because it wasn't caused by anything she did other than being unfortunate enough to be standing in the wrong spot at the wrong time.

This is what my boo-boo kit consisted of before F was born. I never needed anything but band-aids.


However, I have learned it is much different with boys. So far F has had several injuries and trips to the ER and minor emergency clinics. I should have seen the writing on the wall when we spent Halloween of 2004 in the ER when he was only 6 weeks old. He had a cough and was vomiting, but since he was so young the doc wanted to see him in the ER that night.

Then shortly after we moved into our current house he went flying down the driveway on his trike and cut the corner too short, sending him flying head first into the iron mailbox post. That one resulted in a huge goose egg and some bruising, but I was reassured by the nurse on duty that as long as the egg went out instead of in, he'd be fine.

About a year later on the night of his 3rd birthday party he had a chest of drawers fall over on him and his friend William. While the dresser stopped short of falling on the boys thanks to his sister's bed bracing it mid-fall, the drawer flew out and popped him in the noggin again.

Fast forward to Halloween 2007 when we spent the night in the minor emergency clinic after he dropped a brick from the backyard on his big toe and tore the toenail off and mangled the skin around his toe. This image is gross, so you've been warned.....

We spent the next 4 weeks babying that toe and wrapping it in a combination of gauze, pads, ace bandages and tape. He had to wear slippers for a week before we could even get a shoe on him because it was so sore.

Which brings us to the most recent injury. Tuesday night he managed to cut his hand open on one of his monster play trucks. He was racing it around the tile floor like he's done a thousand times before when he slipped and sliced his palm open. I think it must have slid over one of the side view mirrors because it's the only solid thing on that truck that could have caused the cut that resulted.

So after cleaning it up and bandaging it, I thought it would be fine and I sent the kids on to bed. By Wednesday morning it was not only still bleeding, but oozing out of the 52 layers of gauze I had wrapped it in the night before. So, feeling like the mother of the year for my fine treatment of this wound, I called the doctor who prompting advised me to bring him in for a check and possibly some stitches. I felt better after he looked at it when said he didn't think stitches were necessary. However, he did say the deepest part of the 3-inch laceration could have used a stitch the night before, but now it had formed a scab so stitches weren't an option. So, he cleaned it, wrapped it in all the supplies we were already familiar with thanks to the previous toenail catastrophe and sent us home with instructions to keep it wrapped and dry for 2 weeks.

Needless to say, this is what my new and improved first aid kit looks like now.