These little humans have little to know idea of how their actions can physically affect others around them. To be a parent is to know what it’s like to be head-butted, kicked in the groin, bit, and scratched by this little baby that you love completely. Babies can cause real damage, they can break skin, and as they wildly swing their hands around, whatever they are holding can bruise on impact. Part of what makes these injuries worse is the fact that most of the time you aren’t prepared for what’s coming to you.
For those of you who think I’m exaggerating, I’m not. This is a very real thing that is sometimes only a minor annoyance and other times can be very challenging to deal with.
When a baby starts eating solid foods, sometimes they stick too much food in their mouths. This requires you to reach into their mouth with your finger in a hook shape and pull the food out. When you see that look on the face of a baby who looks like they are about to choke, you don’t really have time to hesitate, you just have to go for it, knowing that the baby is in chewing mode. Even when a baby only has a couple teeth, those teeth can be really sharp. You just do it, and you just get in and our as soon as possible. Neither Ollie or Ethan broke skin when I’ve done this for them, but I have a friend who did experience a bite so hard that skin did tear.
Being a dog owner prepared me for this task. Even now, I have to pry open Buffy’s jaws and reach into her mouth to try to grab random food she finds on the street like an old pizza crust. Like a baby, she doesn’t really cooperate and that feeling of teeth pushing into your fingers can be scary.
You do this because you care. You reach into the jaws of another living thing, knowing that you will likely feel pain, because in that moment it could make a huge difference. The cost/benefit math isn’t hard to balance in your mind, but that doesn’t mean that the pain is nonexistent.
Ethan has introduced a whole different kind of baby injury into my life. Little ones have adorable hands with the smallest little fingernails…that are razor sharp. And they are not easy to cut. Even with the Piyo nail scissors which are amazing when it comes to cutting baby fingernails, it’s challenging. Babies don’t like having their fingers held still unless they are asleep, and in that case, it’s often too dark to see the nails clearly to know how deep to cut. You really don’t want to nick the tip of a babies finger. I’ve done it, and even though it’s not that big of a deal, it makes you feel like a horrible parent and the tears and screams of the baby don’t help the situation.
Ethan does this thing when I’m cradling him, holding him against my upright, or have him in the baby carrier where he reaches up to grab onto something. Sometimes he grabs my necklace, other times he grabs my shirt collar, other times he just grabs, and grabs, and grabs. In all of these instances there are fingernails against skin.
Well, I do and it only helps so much.
You got a crying baby who wants nothing but to be picked up and cradled, but you know that there will be pain involved. So last night like many other times, I picked him up and cradled him, and even though he was getting sleep, he was still clawing at my neck, and I tried to just deal with this, but I couldn’t. I had to put him down, which shocked him all the way up awake, which cased screaming as I grabbed the fingernail scissors.
Oh, the screams while I held him tight and each finger firmly. I wasn’t torturing him, but it sure sounded like I did from his reactions. Eventually I did get his fingernails cut, it helped slightly, and by the time, he was so exhausted from screaming his arms finally lay still and calm at his sides.
Parenting is leaning into the pain, sucking it up, and dealing with it. I’ll never forget Ollie as a baby sleeping in my lap on a plane. He thought I was Diana and tried to latch to nurse on my chest as he slept. Somehow he knew where my nipple was under my shirt, and I don’t know how I was able to keep in any expression of pain so he wouldn’t wake up, but I did. You know that cute thing when babies reach in your mouth? Will Ethan was doing that and managed the scratch the skin on the inside of my lower jaw, ouch.
Most of this summer my neck has raw and has been covered in scratches. I'm not sharing this to be some kind of martyr. I mean I could invest in turtle-necks. No one forced me to be a parent. What I'm trying to express is the condition of being parent, the pain that we lean into, and what we do for our kids.
There will be a time when Ethan understands how not to harm me physically but there will other things that he will do that will be challenging to deal with. The only way to handle it is to lean into it. Not hugging your kid, and not loving your kid isn't an option. So you take all that comes with it.
Scratches do heal though and somewhere between giggles and cuddles, present pain becomes a distant memory.
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