Drama from the Mama

One morning Greg was getting Darby ready and I heard a slight *bang,* followed by Darby crying. 

It was one of those startled cries. She wasn't really hurt, and in the 7 seconds it took me to make it to her room, she was already over it, and on to the next thing. 

Apparently Darby was trying to leave the room, Greg was trying to keep her inside, and the door and her head met in an unfortunate way.

But like I said, it wasn't that bad. 

It was Greg's morning off, so we lollygagged around, ran some errands, and then Darby and I  ate lunch while Greg took off for a lunch meeting nearby. 

After lunch and cleanup, I put Darby down for a nap. After wishing her a pleasant sleep, I went into the kitchen for a little snack, known as me sticking a spoonful of peanut butter into a bowl of chocolate chips over and over. It was delicious. Then Darby cried out.

She'd been asleep for ten minutes, and I wondered what was wrong. In her room, I found her rolling around trying to get comfortable again. But she was still asleep.

So I began to back out of the room, when I saw it. I stared in horror for several moments before creeping up for a closer inspection. There was a huge, dark bruise on her forehead.  But not just any bruise. It looked … it looked … concave. 

I hardly dare touch it … but I did. It was concave. It was a huge concave bruise running in a line up her forehead.

'What could it be?' I thought. Then I remembered: 'The door.'

OH. MY. WORD. My daughter has a huge crack in her head. It's actually indented. What is happening?

I quickly left the room and grabbed my cell phone. Fortunately, I reached Greg immediately.

"Hey babe!" he said. "I'm just leaving lunch; what's up?"

"You have to come home now. Right now. Where are you? Come home. There is a huge thing on Darby's head. Did the door hit her on the forehead?" I demanded breathlessly.

"I-I don't know, I-"

"WELL THERE IS A CRACK IN HER HEAD OR SOMETHING. I DON'T KNOW; IT'S GOES IN, LIKE IN TO HER SKULL."

"Ok, ok! I'm coming; I'll be right there," he assured me.

I hung up my phone and went straight to our hall closet where I grabbed Darby's and my coat, hats, gloves and scarves, then threw them on the table.

That's when I suddenly realized that if my daughter had suffered a traumatic head injury the last thing she should be doing is sleeping. In fact, I thought, this is probably why she woke up and was acting fussy in her sleep. She probably has a brain hemorrhage. Oh my word; I need to go wake her up.

But Greg arrived right then and we hurried together into her room. In the hallway, I whispered frantically, 

"My mom told me that with head injuries, swelling is actually a good sign. But not inward swelling! I don't even know what that means, but I think it's the worst kind of swelling!"

Darby was still sound asleep. It had been about five minutes since I'd first seen the bruise, and the first thing I noticed was that it was no longer dark. It was barely visible, actually.

"Where is it?" Greg whispered.

"Right-right there," I replied, pointing to her forehead.

He felt it, and then I felt it. It was hardly indented anymore. Then I saw it: a matching mark on the other side of her forehead, about 4 inches apart.

"Oh wait … there's another one," I pointed out. "Hmmm … oh … oops. I know what this is. She must have fallen asleep with her head propped up against the crib slats. She's actually done that before."

"Really?"

"Um … yeah. That would make an indentation, especially is she slept like that for ten minutes. I bet that's also why she cried out in her sleep and couldn't get comfortable again."

We had snuck out of her room and were in the dining room at this point. Greg noticed all the winter garb thrown across the table and asked what it was about.

"Oh, that was just - I was getting stuff ready to go to the emergency room."

Then Greg laughed super hard and told me was going to have fun "telling everyone this one."

Then I laughed too because we almost took Darby to the ER for crib slat marks.