March 4, 2016
The other week she had her first UTI :(. She had been complaining of stomach pain for a day or two, and we assumed she was constipated again. Then she started running a fever Thursday night, so F stayed home with her on Friday. He called me Friday afternoon to tell me she was saying it hurt to go pee. So that night I took her to urgent care. We were there for about 4 hours, and when the doctor finally saw us, she was annoyed that J was refusing to pee. Eventually she did anyway, and then the doctor took it away. 45 minutes later she came back and said it was a UTI (no shit, sherlock!) and told me that J was extremely dehydrated. We had been in her clinic for hours waiting for her, and J was feeling sick earlier. I was mad. But, she gave us a prescription for chewable amoxicillin, and home we went. The symptoms were gone by late morning the next day.
Many of the mommy blogs out there tout cutting your child’s fingernails and toenails when they’re awake, even as babies, as this allows them to learn to be calm during the process. It took me all of .02 seconds of trying that when J was itty bitty to nope right out. I’ve been clipping her nails in her sleep for 2.5 years now and it’s been great. Except then my teeny flashlight died and before I had a chance to get a new one her nails were like talons. So I explained to her that I wanted to cut her nails. We have words to communicate with her now, see. And she sat patiently through the entire thing. There was no fussing, minimum wiggling, and she understood exactly what was happening to her. So I’m here to say that, in fact, cutting your child’s nails while they sleep won’t ruin them for life and they’ll end up in the guinness book of world records for longest fingernails due to unresolved childhood issues stemming from sleep clipping. Because you know, they totally have that record.
For labor day (6? 7 months ago?) we grilled out. Yes, it was the day I hurt my leg so badly. Anyway, while that event seemed to exlipse the rest of the day for me, it obviously didn’t for J. We were outside and she was telling me about how she stays away from the grill, because it’s hot. And I told her that yes it gets hot, and she started talking about “member, mommy? Member when we had the blue chairs and Amy was here?” I looked at her blankly, and F jumped in to remind me about the grill out we had, and the (blue) camp chairs we’d bought to accommodate people in the yard. J’s eyes lit up that he remembered, and it was amazing to hear her talk about something that happened so long ago. It reminded me of all the times she’s mentioned other things that I don’t believe she could possibly have remembered (riding on a bus to the airport when she was 7 months old? Really?!) but seemed to. I don’t understand quite how or when children lose their early memories, but I guess it’s not a case of being completely unable to form them early on. More that they just.. overwrite them later? I guess? Anyway. I’m grateful that I’ve always tried my hardest to treat her with respect and try to understand her even before she could talk, because seeing how much she actually remembers of the last couple years is a little intimidating.
While we were out there she picked up the lighter we use to light the grill (starter is busted). We took it away and told her it was a grown up tool. Of course, she asked why. We told her that it makes fire, and fire is hot and dangerous. We demonstrated. She asked where it kept the fire, and why wasn’t it hot? Deep breath. She just showed me that I’ve been underestimating her despite my best efforts. So we explained how lighters work. Very generally. I let her shake it to hear the butane slosh. I explained that it turned into gas and came out the tip. I let her hear the butane hissing out, and then I showed her how the lighter sparked and told her it was like when we were getting shocked on the playground earlier, but bigger. The butane is flammable, and so the fire stays lit as long as you hold down the button to keep it hissing out. She listened intently to the entire explanation. I’m definitely curious to see what she says the next time she encounters a lighter. Sometimes I swear I can see her filing away the things I say for later.
Crap, out of time!