Mother's Premonition

I was in the shower this morning thinking, "I don't have any pressing plans to get out of the house until this evening, so I could send Doug with the car." But visions of needing to visit the ER popped into my head and I realized that we hadn't had an injury in a while. Mary chipped her front tooth (and blackend the other) back in January. William split his forehead open in April, but other than the smallest bruises here and there, we've not had any injuries since then. It hit me that we are due and that I should expect something soon. Not an hour later, as William tried to get himself settled at the kid-sized table to color, he slipped and banged his mouth on the chair, sending his tooth into his lower lip. You see it happening in slow-motion, then hear the scream, and then the bloody mouth comes running toward you, but you still can't believe it's happening.

Once we got all the blood cleared away and got a good look at it, it's not so bad. The lip is swollen and bruised and he is complaining that it hurts a lot. A little ice, a little Tylenol and he's acting like himself again, but I can tell it hurts him still.

How on earth did I know this was going to happen today? I love my boys dearly, but I'm really beginning to wonder if I'm able to handle the "tough boy" stuff that mothering entails. I'm not queasy at the sight of blood, but I ache to my bones when one of my kids is hurt.