Serious crying

It was a horrible feeling. I had finally wrangled the kids up to the table for lunch (english muffin & egg sandwiches with canned peaches) and was carrying the baby across the kitchen when M screamed. She was falling backwards off the chair, booster seat and all. But I was too far away to catch her. As if in slow motion, I saw her land on the floor on top of the booster seat, then tip backwards over it on the small of her back. Her head flew forward, then back to land on the linoleum.

For a moment, my first instinct was to throw whatever I had in my hands in any random direction as I raced to my daughter, but immediately I was checked as I realized the object in my hands was the baby.

M took a deep breath and cried hard, the cry of an injured and frightened child. As I rushed toward her, I looked around frantically for a place to put the baby down. Wooden chair? No. Linoleum floor, among the crumbs and just-spilled milk? Not the best idea. Besides, carefully setting the baby down anywhere would prolong the time until I could get to M. I felt so frantic and helpless.


I ended up holding the baby in one arm while trying unsuccessfully to pick up M with the other arm. Thankfully, she wasn't seriously hurt--more frightened than anything. She said the only thing that hurt was her tailbone area. Poor kid. She seemed to get over it fairly quickly, though.

Then I set A's plate of egg sandwich in front of her and forgot to warn her that it was hot. She found out when she burned herself picking it up. I apologized profusely and felt terrible, of course.

There are a lot of things that are essentially impossible to do safely while holding a baby--cooking over a hot stove and bathing other children being two of them. I had ample opportunity to find this out today.

Baby E cried more and harder today, on her 4-week birthday, than on any other day since she was born. It wasn't just fussing or discomfort crying, either. Definitely not the type of non-emergency cry I have learned to ignore if necessary. It was sudden, full-out, high-pitched, non-stop, "come on baby, breathe!" hysterical screaming. The cry of pure panic and/or pain.

It was the "something is really wrong" cry. Only I couldn't figure out what was wrong. And we were supposed to be getting ready for an afternoon wedding that we really couldn't miss, since A was the flower girl.

I fed her, burped her, changed her, gave her gas drops, held her in every different position I could think of, fed her some more. I tried rocking, shushing, swaddling, propping her up in the bouncy seat. She fell asleep several times, but it never lasted for more than literally a couple of minutes after I put her down. The longest stretch she slept from waking up in the morning until we left for the wedding sometime after 2:30 p.m. was about 5-10 minutes, during which I managed to get most of the way through the older girls' baths before she was screaming again.

The only thing that helped at all was holding her. She would still fuss, but at least she wasn't screaming--except for that last 45 minutes before we had to leave, when even holding her only very slightly abated the intensity of her screams.

I laid her down and let her scream when I absolutely had to and rather unsuccessfully tried to get all of us fed and ready to go while holding her the rest of the time.

About halfway through the getting-ready process I discovered that A's flower girl dress was in the trunk of DH's car, which he had taken to work. And the dress I was planning to wear had gotten all twisted and shrunken in the dryer (yes, it was supposed to be washer and dryer safe). No problem, I had a backup. Only it apparently wasn't washer-safe, even though I'd washed it in cold water and hung it to dry. It looked like some strange, failed textile/chemical experiment.

I had two other nursing dresses. But one of them was missing a button on the bodice and the other was not only in the dirty clothes hamper, but also solid black. Not exactly appropriate for a wedding.

Have I mentioned that laundry is not my strong suit?

I called DH about A's dress. He had not planned to come to the wedding since it was so early in the day. But, amazingly, he had already decided that he would need to get off work early and come to the wedding with us. He said that when he saw what it was like at the rehearsal last night, he realized I would really need his help. Between nursing/holding the baby, coaching A through her flower girl duties, and entertaining M while keeping everyone out of the fountain and the mud, I don't think I could have done it without him. What a great guy. He stayed in the background during the wedding in case he's still contagious, though he's mostly over his illness.

He got home about 15 minutes before we needed to leave. At that point none of us were dressed, nobody had their hair done and most of us were in tears. Yes, I was one of the crying group. We scrambled to get ready. The baby needed to nurse again, and it seemed there was no way we could all get ready in time. We decided we would need to just send A with DH to get there in time for photos and the rest of us would come in time for the wedding an hour later, after we finished getting ready. Then the baby finally fell into a fitful sleep.

We went into warp speed. I decided to forget being perfect or even pretty good and just worry about being dressed and getting out the door. I threw on something that was frumpy, kind of ugly and a bit wrinkled, but would have to do. We whipped clothes over the girls' heads and I braided and beribboned A's hair while DH found everyone's shoes and got the baby into the carrier. I burned my finger rinsing E's pacifier in the insta-hot, and DH developed a cough sometime during the course of the day, but we all made it in one piece.

We ended up skipping several things we had planned to do, like bathing Baby E and changing her into something more dressy, braiding M's hair, and bringing along snacks and books. We forgot about the wedding gift (we'll have to give it to them later), but we made it to the wedding location. And we were only 5 minutes late, which meant we were actually there well before they needed A for pictures.

I had time to nurse the baby before the wedding while DH kept track of the older girls. Since the baby was being held constantly, she slept through the entire wedding.

The bride has a 3 1/2-year-old son, so the wedding was very kid-friendly, complete with a reception table full of bubbles, coloring books and toy cars. The girls behaved beautifully and A was gorgeous and sweet as the flower girl.

A few highlights (besides the bride, who was radiant, and the groom, who looked like he'd won the lottery):

The girls did a great job of staying out of the fountain and the dirt. M kept walking over to the fountain, hovering near it, making her way all the way around it, and then pulling herself away. She wanted so badly to put her hands in the water, but restrained herself beautifully. It was really cute to watch, and I was so proud of her.

A was so friendly and put everyone at ease. She hugged and comforted the nervous ringbearer (the bride's son) and sweetly encouraged him so that he didn't seem to mind his tuxedo or his march down the aisle after all. She was so sweetly intent on her Very Important Job of dropping flower petals that she walked very slowly and barely looked up on her way down the aisle, but everyone thought it was adorable. And she smiled radiantly the rest of the time. She posed happily for photos, and the photographers gushed about how beautiful she was. She briefly escaped from her seat in the middle of the wedding ceremony to try to gather up the flower petals from the path and put them back into the basket.

M sat quietly during the ceremony, snuggling up to me and constantly hugging and kissing the baby. While A colored so intently she didn't want her cake, M ate both her own piece of cake and A's. They came home with bubbles and toy cars after a lovely afternoon playing with other children in the sunny yard.

Baby E slept and slept, even while being passed around and admired. She only woke up briefly when A accidentally kicked her in the head. (DH was holding her, so I'm not exactly sure how that happened, but you didn't think we'd escape this day with anyone not getting injured, did you?) She didn't even cry then, though, and went right back to sleep.

I enjoyed the wedding and the visits with friends. And I think DH at least enjoyed the food, and watching the girls have such a wonderful time.

Baby E has continued to cry a lot this evening. She wakes up and cries every time I put her down. Now she's crying and crying again despite being held.

DH went out to buy and deliver the gift for his niece and will purchase a vibrating bouncy seat while he's out. We figure that since Baby E loves the car, the vibrating seat is at least worth a try.

Baby E has burped and passed gas several times, but still seems miserable. One of us may end up sleeping in the recliner with her on our chest tonight. She doesn't have a fever or any other obvious signs of illness. But if she's still acting like this tomorrow I may take her in to the doctor to rule out an ear infection or other illness.

Meanwhile, I'm getting really good at typing one-handed.