Finally. The recognition I deserve. They were giving these awards out at Providence St Joseph Hospital, in the ER, to all moms who “turned their back for a second.” Lucky me. I have so many people to thank.

I have to say it all started 8 1/2 months ago when my husband was sure our newborn was already 2 years old, and he was a lot more, let’s say “confident” with Zoe than I thought was OK. Insert some “honey, she’s just a baby” comments to get the full picture of how lucky my husband has been.

Flash forward 4 months or so to when she started to sit up, and guess who was the first to let her bang her head on the hardwood floor (hint: it wasn’t me). Flash forward through 4 more of those “incidents”, each one followed by a certain look from me towards a certain father of my child. Yes, he’s a lucky guy.

Flash forward to last weekend, when Zoe twisted her body on the changing table on daddy’s watch and banged her elbow (no mark, just a loud sound and a spooked little girl). Not only did dear old dad get a look, he got a TRAINING from the absolutely perfect mother of his child. “Honey, you have to keep a hand on her the whole time. Like THIS.” And I proceeded to SHOW HIM how to do it right. Yep, LUCKY GUY.

Then put yourself in my shoes last Wednesday night, while Bart was away in Boston and Zoe had a mommy night. At around 6 pm I was on the phone with sweet Bart, telling him that our lives would never be the same. Not only can our daughter officially crawl (click that link for video proof), but she’s figured out that she can crawl ANYWHERE (not just to the edge of her mat). I know this because she was in the living room and followed me into the kitchen, without missing a beat. So, she’s mobile, period.

Knowing this, please ask me why I thought it was OK to sit her in the middle of our bed (as we’ve done tons of times) and turn my back to put my clothes in the laundry hamper. Why, oh, why. NOT ONE SECOND later I heard a THUMP and turned to see my daughter had taken a header from the bed to our hardwood floor. Insert screaming. As the bump on her head ballooned up and turned blue, I went into panic mode, grabbed a bag of ice and my wallet, put her in her car seat and sped towards the emergency room with one arm in the back seat putting ice on her head while she screamed (in my mind if she was screaming, she was alive, and that was good). Oh, what I did NOT grab was the diaper bag. Bonus points on the Mom of the Year Award scale.

At the ER I got a lot of “it happens to every mom” (which by the way doesn’t make a mom feel any better), and I had to call my husband and explain why I was in the ER with his daughter. He didn’t even make me feel bad about it (which made me feel bad about it). And 2 hours later, when we finally saw a doctor and ironically Zoe’s head looked BETTER than when we had arrived, a nice lady doctor told me that Zoe’s bump was “really big”, that most bumps were “not very big”, and recommended a CT scan. They tried to give her some Benadryl to keep her still during the procedure (imagine watching your tiny child go through one of these machines…). Of course, she spit up the Benadryl instantly, so imagine watching your SCREAMING child go through one of those machines.

Thankfully, the screen itself is fast, and 2.5 hours later we found out that Zoe’s head was perfect. At midnight we headed home to finish up mommy night. Needless to say, I have a lot of apologizing to do to my husband for all the schooling he’s had to tolerate over the past 8.5 months. As it turns out, I’m the one that could use some training. Wish me luck?