I Survived My Baby’s First Scar

baby scarAn ER doctor said, ”If you take 10 men and put them into one room and ask them to look up, seven of them will have a scar on their chin.” Well, my friends, my son Holt will now be in that group of men when he grows up.

A couple of weeks ago, he decided to fly off the couch and into the coffee table. It happened in less than a split second and, as a result of this 7-month-old baby thinking he was Superman, split open his chin. It was mayhem after it happened, to say the least. The baby was screaming, my daughter was screaming because of the blood, I was screaming, ”How did this happen? I was RIGHT here!” And I was also feeling quite dizzy because of all the blood. I was also screaming for my fiance, who happened to be in the shower, and couldn’t hear me.

I can’t stand the sight of blood, and boy was there blood. I looked at the gape (yes, it was a GAPE) in his chin and immediately thought, ”Yeah, this needs stitches,” while continuing to scream for my fiance who was still in the shower. Also, you should know this was at 7:45 a.m. on a Monday morning, and, really, could a Monday morning start worse than this?

When my fiance FINALLY got out of the shower and came downstairs, he was met with me screaming, ”We have to go to the hospital now! Where’s his Health Card? Why do you have to take showers that are so long?” and my daughter who was still crying, and bloody tissues everywhere.

We dropped my daughter off at school (it’s on the way to the hospital) and headed to the emergency room. My baby had stopped crying approximately three minutes after he had split opened his chin, which proves that babies are really not that smart (If I had split open my chin, I’d be bawling and freaking out about getting stitches) and also completely more durable than we think they are. Though he had blood pouring down his chin, he was as happy as a clam.

First hospital visits with babies are always fun, aren’t they? Someone should really come up with a special deodorant for mothers who have to take their baby to the hospital for the first time. Because you just sweat so much. You are so nervous.

The first time I took my daughter to the hospital I was practically crying because I thought she couldn’t breathe and was sweating so profusely it was like I had done a spin class. I overreacted on that visit. The diagnosis? A cold. Well, c’est la vie! I was a first time mother and I thought she was dying.

But this time around, it was pretty damn obvious we needed to go to the hospital. I wasn’t overreacting, because not to gross you out, the gape in his chin was like a second mouth. In any case, they took him almost immediately (I think they take babies quite quickly) and used some sort of super glue to close his gape. I didn’t even have the chance to ask if he’ll have a scar before the doctor said, ”He will have a scar.”

Oh. Okay. But that’s okay. I think scars on men are kind of sexy. (Who doesn’t?) In fact, Holt’s father has a scar on his chin that he got when he was two trying to climb up a counter and then, because 2-year olds-aren’t that smart either, couldn’t figure how to get down. So he just let himself drop down and hit his chin on the counter.

What worries me more is that my son is a boy’s boy. He loves trucks and is quite violent with his toys. He likes to hit things (not people. Not yet.) My best friend, who has three sons, is at the emergency room almost every week. I’ll call her and say, ”Hey, where are you?”

And her answer will be, ”On the way to emergency. Think Jason fractured his ankle.” Or, ”Just waiting in emergency. I think Ben broke his arm”¦again.” Or, ”Just waiting to get the X-rays back.”

So it’s not so much the scar I’m worried about (which I’m really not worried about at all) it’s more the number of times I’ll be visiting the emergency room with my son in the years to come. I tell you, with my daughter, I’ve only been to the emergency room (knock on wood) once, and that was all because I overreacted to a cold. But if Holt already has a scar at seven months, what the heck is he going to have gotten himself into by the time he’s seven years old?

But I did learn a good party trick from all of this. Next time you’re at a party, gather up 10 men, and see if it’s true. See if at least seven of them have scars on their chins. And tell me, it is sexy, right?

(photo: Vankad / Shutterstock)

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