Playing with Scissors

So, when most kids get their hands on a pair of scissors they cut paper or, worst case scenario, hair. Well, not my kid. Tommy was sitting at the kitchen table cutting paper scraps into tiny little pieces. It looked like he was using the scissors properly so, I let him (also avoiding a potential meltdown). Jose walks in while Tiffany and I are in the kitchen making dinner. He carefully asks "Do you know Tommy has scissors?" In unison, Tiffany and I flippantly answer "Yes". Jose shrugs his shoulders and returns to the beer making activities in the garage. Not a minute later Tommy starts whining "Oh No! I beeding. Owie Mommy!" Earlier in the day he had a terrible nosebleed so I initially thought that his nose had started bleeding again. I look over and sure enough Tommy was bleeding. But not the same way he had been earlier. He had taken the scissors to his nose and sliced a perfect "U" shape into the tip of his nose. See exhibit A below. Oh the adventures we have in our home. (Please Note that this was and extremely minor incident with the potential for serious injury. We have since taken the proper precautions to prevent such things from happening again.)

In the middle of the night he starts crying and yelling. I go into his room to see what the matter is and when I ask, he just lays there and yells and cries. I plead with him to stop yelling and crying and to just tell me what's wrong. Why can't he just tell me what he needs?!? He just lays there looking at me and crying. Finally he says 'Ice water!'. I get his ice water, and he settles down. I kiss him goodnight and close the door. The moment I get back under the warm covers he starts at it again. I lay there for a minute silently hoping that he'll stop; trying desperately to telepathically communicate with him: "Tommy, shhhh, it's ok. Just settle down. Drink some water. Shhhh. You'll wake everyone up." I come to the realization that I have no telepathic abilities whatsoever because it is clearly not working. So, I get up and burst into his room and say "Tommy! Stop Yelling!" and when I reach his bed I notice that his nose has started bleeding again and it's all over his face and his pillow. I felt terrible. I cleaned him up, made him drink some ice water and turned his pillow over to the clean side (Yes, I should have changed the pillowcase but it was the middle of the night and I don't know if I have any extras anyway). So I asked him if he wanted me to hold him in my desperate attempt to clear my conscience of feeling like a bad mommy for yelling at him. He said "woking chair". So I took him into the living room and rocked him until he went to sleep. It was just what I needed. Looking down at his sweet face while he slept I thought about how these moments become less and less frequent as they grow older. I was astonished at how all of a sudden he was so big. The last time I rocked him like that he was half the size he is now. And, it wasn't very long ago that his head, that is now the size of a large melon, was once the size of a softball. I sat there rocking him for as long as I could keep my eyes open and told him that I was going to bring him back to his bed. He whispered "OK" and went right back to sleep. We both slept soundlessly for the rest of the night. I learned that what he needs is sometimes what I need too.

EXHIBIT A: