Yesterday... Unedited

This is not for the faint of heart.

Or coffee lovers.



I was talking to a friend and trying to balance the stroller that had tipped over by the donut table. Charlie dunked his hand in my cup of coffee. I didn't even see him do it.

When he started screaming, the entire church was congregated in the lobby staring while I held his contorted, thrashing, panicked self. His hand was swelling and turning red.

Don't freak out I said to me as I freaked out.

I took Charlie to the bathroom and ran cold water over his hand. He screamed louder. I took him back out to the lobby and asked Greg to go for ice.

He brought back one cube. Someone else handed me a bowl filled with ice water. Other people started handing me odd items they found that might help, but nothing would calm him.

We should take him home. Greg and I grabbed our stuff and headed to the car. I knew he would calm down once we were away from the mass of people. But he didn't. And his fingers were molting.

I started crying because it was my coffee, my negligence, and my fault. Greg is frustrated because he can't fix it. We snap at each other and debate what to do. Charlie screams and Toby keeps talking about trains as if the world is not tumbling into anarchy.

Our church is nowhere near a hospital, but we commit to an ER and take off on a terrible ride.

Charlie is outside of himself with anguish. I can't hold him in the car so I gently rub his cheek even though he keeps pushing my arm away while he waves his hurt hand around and beats it on his own face.

At the hospital, Greg lets me out at the ER doors and I am greeted by a stoic front desk worker. Maybe she was trying to impress me with her de-sensitization to calamity. I was not impressed. She didn't say a single word as I fumbled around the desk for the sign in sheet, crying, and holding my baby whose finger skin was dangling around his knuckles.

I hate you I don't say when I hand the form over the counter.

We wait. Charlie is hysterical. No one reacts but us. Greg goes for ice in the vending area and the front desk lady shrugs her shoulders when we ask how long.

I hate you I don't say again, but Greg does. She goes to the back and when she comes out a person is with her to collect Charlie. She threatens to call security on Greg who is tearing out his hair with frustration. The lady takes her time showing us to a room and I wish she would prove her point in some other way because my baby is hurting so bad.

They give Charlie a shot of morphine and after a few minutes his sobs melt into sniffs, and then he is out. He had been crying for two hours.

We need to transfer him to Parkland, the doctor says.

Really. He's pretty burned, huh? That's what we were thinking during the infinity wait when my sons shrieking had to compete with the crickets in your lobby.

They call an ambulance for me and Charlie and Greg takes Toby home. He will meet up with us after he finds a sitter. Neither of us has our phone so we say a wary good-bye.

At Parkland we are greeted by a sixteen-year-old resident who is skippity do about having a pediatric burn patient. He is so proud of his medical knowledge and experience and he explains how cleaning the burn will be very painful, but luckily Charlie will not remember it.

Oh that is lucky, Doogie, I say while I think I hate you in my mind. Thankfully the burn team arrives with a genuine, tender-hearted doctor and nurse who treat Charlie like a sweet baby boy and I am relieved.

They explain the burn care carefully, but nothing can prepare a mother for that kind of trauma. I wondered how many moms have restrained their child for a bigger burn than Charlie's. It broke my heart.

When they were done, they bandaged him up nicely and gave us instructions to change the wrap at home.

At 4:30, 8 hours after I left the house for church in the morning, we left Dallas and headed home.

Charlie slept the whole way.

Today he is fussy and groggy, but fine. He wants me to hold him when he is awake and I am glad that he needs me. He is going to recover with no problems at all, thanks to the wonder of modern medicine.

I, however, am permanently scarred.