Two is Better Than One: Guest Post by Adrienne McGuire

Being the youngest one in the house, and, coincidentally, with a big personality to boot, my son Ethan has always tried to do the things the rest of us are doing, even when he was too little to be doing them.  Washing hands, using the potty, blowing his nose, playing with his brother’s toys, walking up steps instead of crawling up them, climbing things he should not be climbing!!!!  Feeding the dog, pulling his stool up to the kitchen counter to help me cook meals, playing on the computer with his big brother….

And of course - most of these activities have resulted in injury!  When he was little he was always too brave for his age; his mind hadn’t yet developed that all important “risk assessment” but he still wanted to do everything we were doing.  Either way, I have always accepted that he is going to have more scrapes and bruises than my first son, who was basically a fat, cranky blob until he was like 3. 

I remember one morning when Ethan was not even two years old, I was having my coffee, sitting at my computer, and Ethan walked to the other end of the table and climbed up to face me, pretending to be his father.  This was one of the most adorable things I ever saw!  He sat there going, “Daddy! I daddy!” Then he would hide behind his father’s computer screen and peek out with a killer grin that got me laughing every time.

Each time he played this game, I remember pushing fear down lower in my stomach.  I was a very nervous and worried young mom. Each time he leaned forward to see me, my mind pictured him sliding too far forward and falling right off the edge of the chair and cracking his head/face into the table - careening directly to the floor in a puddle of blood.  Dramatic?  Perhaps. 

Perhaps NOT!  One day that exact scenario played out!  As he peeked at me from across the table, I saw his face light up with fear as his balance shifted, and the next sound was the crack of his mouth against the edge of the table.  Followed by the thud of 27 pounds onto the floor.  And when I finally reached him to gather him in my arms, he was covered in blood.  It was pouring out of his mouth.

I hurried him (trying to remain calm) to the kitchen, where I sopped up about 10 rags full of his blood.  I was really starting to get disturbed!  It appeared to me that the little flap of skin that connects the upper lip to the gums was cut. It did stop bleeding eventually, and I gave him some Tylenol and he took a 3 hour nap. 

The cutest part of the incident was that while Ethan was screaming bloody murder, his big brother Aiden (who was 3 at the time) was doing #2 in the bathroom and I could hear him humming the entire time.  He was oblivious.  He was just happy he had emptied his bowels.  With the flush of the toilet and the click of the bathroom faucet, he appeared in the doorway to the kitchen inquiring, “What happened?”

I said, “Ethan fell off a chair and cut his lip.”  Ethan was sobbing and clinging to me.  Aiden got visibly distressed at the sight of all of his brother’s blood and his upper lip began to quiver in sympathy.  He rushed over to us and grabbed Ethan’s arm and started rubbing him, saying, “It’s ok, your brother’s here.  Your brother’s here, Ethie!  It’s ok.  You will be alright now.”

So you see, I can be in the middle of a crisis, covered in toddler blood, deaf in one ear from said toddler screaming, trying to wipe snot and blood and tears simultaneously, while assessing the need or lack thereof to visit an emergency room, all the while wondering how well my son washed his hands in the bathroom, and all of a sudden a little, tiny miracle happens that just lights me up from the inside.

And you know what?  Aiden was right.  His brother did make it all better.  I’m so glad I had two of them.

Adrienne McGuire is a writer, educator, and wellness enthusiast living in New Jersey with her two sons, who are seven and nine, and her new husband, Brian. She abandoned the corporate world in order to live the life she really wanted and became an entrepreneur at the age of 36. Her professional journey led her to DailyPath, where she is now an integral part of the writing and design team.