A more notorious first...

(pre injury)

Yesterday, Eliot bled on me for the first time.

Being the rambunctious little creeper that he is, he is constantly a little banged up- scratches and bruises and mystery scrapes, but yesterday, real blood was shed.

We were in the train on our way back from a visit with my friend Sara. He was standing on my lap looking out the window and dancing around. He twisted, and I lost my grip on him, and he fell to a sitting position on my lap. No big deal, this happens all the time, right?

Well, this time the little table in the train next to the window happened to catch him smack in the face as he came down. He hit so hard I was sure that his nose was broken, or he'd lost an eye, or his two little teeth had been knocked out. Or all of the above. I turned him around to hold him and comfort him, and that's when he spit blood all over me as he let out the world's loudest scream and then started crying hysterically.

Breast feeding once again saved the day, as I was able to nurse him to comfort him and he calmed down immediately. I started poking and prodding his face, trying to figure out where the blood had come from, and I called Frederic, who called the pediatrician.

I finally figured out the injury had to be in his mouth somewhere, because the rest of him was fine. So I stopped breastfeeding him and gingerly felt around. He didn't flinch when I pushed his teeth around, and his tongue looked ok.

Frederic called back and said the pediatrician just wanted us to monitor him for a concussion, but that he had probably just bitten his tongue or lip. By now, all of five minutes later, Eliot was happily looking out the window again and experimentally sucking on his upper lip. I took a closer look and could see it was split open on the inside, and there was a flap of skin hanging down that he was sucking on. "Gee, did I forget a bit of apple up here from breakfast?" he was asking himself.

Anyway, all is well. I did suffer a small heart attack, but am recovering nicely.