Natural consequences

Sometimes as a parent nature has a way of disciplining our children for us thereby negating our need to step in. I'd like to highlight just such an occasion that occurred last week with my older middle child.

THE BACK STORY

My husband and I have told him a hundred times to stay off of the "hang ups", an exercise machine that turns you upside down to relieve pressure on your back while you do sit up, and a hundred times he's "forgotten". Over and over and over again we've caught him climbing on it and over and over again we've told him it's dangerous to play on it, it's for adults, it's NOT A TOY! Still his short term memory has refused to store that information into long term memory.

THE INCIDENT

Date: January 4th.
Time: 4:15 p.m.

At approximately 4:15 p.m. while the oldest child (15 years) was watching the younger two (5 years and 2 1/2 years) middle son decided to once again "forget" the rules of staying off his dad's Hang Up's machine. While the oldest was pre-occupied cleaning up the youngest the middle child took that opportunity to once again scale the machine. Unlike every other time before there was no adult present to tell him, for the millionth time, to get down it's not a toy. The lock on this particular mechanism was loose and the weight of said child at the apex of the machine caused an overbalance of weight which caused the lock to slip and slam the middle child into the floor face first.

MY DAY PRIOR TO THE INCIDENT

I work at a Community College full time. I work in the counseling/advising office. This loosely translates as I deal with grown adults that still think they're children and teenagers who whine and cry like they are toddlers. This particular day was my first day back at work after the long Christmas break. In short it sucked balls. I was anticipating a nice night at home with my family some dinner and an early bed time.

WHAT I CAME HOME TO INSTEAD

When I walked through the door ,after a bad day at work, I found the middle child, we'll call him Quasimodo, with a wash rag full of ice pressed to his broken and bleeding mouth. The toddler in a diaper and the oldest freaking out. *Le Sigh* Since turning around and pretending that I didn't know these children was not an option I assessed the situation. One chipped tooth, one loose tooth, and one broken tooth, swollen lips and two abrasion on the left eyelid, LOTS OF BLOOD! Mouth wounds bleed, well head wounds in general bleed a lot so copious amounts of blood are expected when head trauma is involved. The blood didn't bother me, the broken teeth alarmed me, and at this point I'm not freaking out. I've done the concussion thing before with my youngest so I knew what questions to ask him, I knew how to assess him and he checked out. He had a headache and his mouth hurt. Yeeeahhh cause you just got face planted into the basement floor genius. I placed my first phone call to the after hours dentist number and made an emergency appointment for him to come in the next day and have his teeth and mouth checked out. Since no teeth were actually busted out of the mouth the dentist felt some children's Tylenol for the pain and ice for the swelling would be sufficient. Sounded good to me so I drugged him and iced him and called my sister in law to come over and watch him because I still had volunteer work to do at the church that night.

WHAT I CAME HOME TO PART DEAUX

He puked. Lots! Not once but twice. My next phone call was to the pediatrics after hours exchange. I knew when I placed the call he had a concussion. I knew before they said anything that they were going to send us to the ER. I knew all of this and still I had to make the call. What I was not expecting was to be asked by the ER nurse if he was wearing a helmet when he hit the floor. First off he's not special needs, I know you were all thinking it it's ok I thought it too when she asked. Secondly this was not some planned experiment to see if the helmet would in fact protect his brains in the case of a head trauma. Thirdly no my kids, and I'd love to see the person whose kids actually do this, wear helmets while at home in the house because, and call me crazy, I didn't think it would be necessary to protect them inside their own home!

RECAP

Middle son a.k.a. Quasimodo climbs up on his dad's Hang ups machine after being repeatedly told not to. The lock on the machine comes off and he's flung face first into the basement floor. End result after a day and half at the ER is a concussion restricting him to limited physical activity one chipped tooth, one loose tooth, and one broken canine.

NATURAL CONSEQUENCES

Quasimodo is effectively grounded due to the concussion. He's not allowed to participate in P.E. class at school, he's restricted from playing on the playground or participating in any activity where a head injury could occur. Due to the state his mouth is in he's restricted to the type and consistency of the foods he can eat. Soft foods only which rules out any of his favorite foods such as pizza, spaghetti, eggplant Parmesan or any of the other foods we usually eat for dinner. Milk and dairy based products such as yogurt and soft cheeses are highly recommended to help strengthen the teeth that are injured and keep them from prematurely falling out. Last but not least headaches and mouth pain expected to last for a minimum of a week and up to two weeks.

I, with all of my creativity as a parent, could not have come up with a better consequence for disobedience. Hopefully this has driven the point home that we don't play on things intended for adults and when our parents tell us no it's for our own good.