Boys Will Be Boys and Thus Give Their Moms Heart Attacks

Children. They're supposed to keep one young.

At least that's what I'd heard.

Mine seen hell-bent on running me old and ragged.

Once again, due to the antics of a certain almost-eight-year-old, I have aged considerably over the past few hours.

Well, to be fair, it wasn't really his fault. It happened at school and it was a total accident. He was watching a Beyblade match when his cousin ran over, wanting to show him something and excitedly yanked him by the collar. My boy tripped over the tangle of feet underfoot, tried to maintain balance, failed and smacked his forehead on the cement flooring -- leaving a big, deep gash half-an-inch above his eye.

The Nephew was absolutely horrified and traumatised. It was SIL's day to pick up the boys and by the time she went, she found her nephew missing and her son an incoherent, blubbering mess who just kept repeating his cousin's name and showing his mother his bloody handkerchief with which he had tried to mop up the blood.

She called me from the car and I fell off my chair. I called the MIM and he rushed home. We waited for the SIL's call to tell us she was close to the hospital near our home and we rushed there.

It was the Nephew who was a mess; the poor boy's face was red and his eyes were swollen from crying non-stop. And the EO? What can I say? He was a trooper. Still jabbering away, nineteen-to-the-dozen, giving us a full action replay as to what happened along with running commentary. When he heard that he needed stitches, well, that's when the cookie crumbled. Having been the recipient of four stitches on the sole of his foot a couple of years ago, he absolutely had no desire to go through the experience again. I didn't either, of course.

But, go through it he did. There were tears and screams while half his eyebrow was being shaved off, while the anasthesia was being injected around the wound and of course when he got a glimpse of the curved needle and thread. But when the actual stitching started and he realised that he couldn't feel a thing, he was back to his normal, chatty self.

Sigh. He's been in perfectly good humour since he's come back. He's enjoying the attention and the cuddles. He's fast asleep now and I've promised to bring him into my bed tonight.

He's fast asleep.

Me. I'm greyer and wrinklier than I woke up this morning.