The title for this post is fitting in more than one way this afternoon. But before I launch in to a tirade of self-pity, let me just rant about apologize if things get a little wacky in here. As many of you probably know, Blogger went off the reservation yesterday and ate two big ole posts of mine. Who knows if they will return, but I sure as heck ain’t typin’ em up again.

Today, something happened that I’m so not proud of.  I hesitated even coming in here and writing about it, seeing as how the Internet is just full of crows waiting to pick at the weak.  But here goes.

My daughter, you see, is a bit of a dare devil.  The girl has no fear, none.  She willingly jumps off counters in to adult arms, has figured out how to use her glider and diaper pail as stepping stools to get on to her changing table, attends swim class with an air of Been-There-Done-That as she plunges in to the pool at whim, and in general gives me a heart attack on a daily basis. 

So, today, we were at Costco.  And since my little Houdini can wiggle out of the child seat belts in the front, we’ve taken to placing her in the big part of the cart.  Yep, you can guess what’s coming.  She’s sitting down, I turn to grab deodorant off the shelf, and as I turn back around, there’s Miss P, perched on the side of the cart.  Faster than I can take a step, off she goes, falling backwards out of the cart and crashing down on to that damn hard wholesale concrete floor.  A parent’s worst nightmare.  The kind that you hear about and think “no way is my kid or am I stupid enough to do THAT.”  Even as I type this, I can see the sight of Miss P falling and the look on her face, can hear the sound of my sweet little girl’s head hit the ground, can feel the hysterical wiggling of her body as I tried to calm her down afterward.

I know it’s not the smartest place to put your child.  What I didn’t expect was the blatant un-helpfulness with which I was greeted when trying to find help.  I could just sense the judgement in people’s stares, especially from the parents that have their child strapped in to the front seat of the carts.  A+ for them.  What I needed in that moment was someone to step in, see that I was in need, and help me out.  Would it have killed someone to check if we were alright, to get us a bag of ice, and tell me that it’s not the first time this has ever happened?  The following correspondence was the one that did it in:

Older woman walking past me as I hunker down on the floor near the bathrooms with Screaming Banshee:  Is she alright?
Me: No, she fell
Older woman: Not out of the cart though, right?
Me:  Yep, out of the cart

What kind of assistance is THAT?  I’m already crying, you don’t have to make me feel even worse about it.  It is interactions like this that turn me off from people.  Ugh.

So, I get Miss P calmed down to a whimper.  She says she wants to go, so we make it to the car, where her lovey is.  She starts sucking her thumb and seems fine, but then starts getting groggy, so I call her pediatrician and take her over.  Two blocks away from the office, Miss P perks up and seems back to normal.  Thankfully the pediatrician we saw had the same thing happen to her and didn’t make me feel horrible about it.  I believe Miss P is fine – not a bump on her noggin yet, no vomiting, no sign of a concussion so far (how is that even possible?  Does she have a lead head?), she’s running around the house like nothing happened, and hopefully we are in the clear.

Still, I can’t get over the guilt, embarrassment, and humiliation of it all.  How could I be so stupid?  How could Miss P be so fearless? 

And with her fall, down went my self-esteem as a mother and caregiver.  Crying on the way home from the pediatrician (man, did I pick a bad day to try out non-waterproof mascara!), I just kept thinking that I need a personal renovation.  Like a giant car wash, where I’d go through one end with all of my dirt and grime and hot/disappointed/un-confident/sad emotions, and come out the other side shiny, sparkling and ready to take on the road.