Crazy Day!!!--Long sorry, need to vent!!!

neednewtechnique

New Member
Today was a very crazy day at our house....our 13 year old had her "teenage" birthday on the 29th of Aug and wanted a new hairstyle that involved black hairdye and blonde hairdye and since we were going to make some extreme changes to the color, she decided that she needed some styling tools to go along with it. Curling irons, straighteners, blowdryer, etc. A good idea?? Sounds like it may be, but trust me, it WASN'T. I have been off work this week and since I am used to having things to fill my day with work, I have been a bit stir crazy sitting at home, since 2 of our 3 children are in school all day everyday. So, I decided it was time to tackle a project and go upstairs to the girls' rooms and do some re-arranging... the girls all wanted to trade beds, so I was in the 13 year old's room taking her bed apart and my 3 year old was up there "helping me". Well, she bumped into the vanity and the straigtener started to tumble off the top. My dear sweet helpful baby trying to save it from hitting the floor caught it just in time, only to discover that the darn thing was ON... not only ON, but ON SETTING 25, the highest setting it has, which is 356 DEGREES!!! And of course she didn't grab it around the outside, she stuck her poor little fingers right on the metal plate and burned her hand!!!! I tried to call the doctor, and with NO LUCK he was completely booked all day and could not see her, but offered to call ahead for me to let the ER know I was coming if I wanted to drive her to the Hospital!!! This is, of course, after mentioning that he didn't really think she would need to be seen for such a minor burn (that was enough for me to decide I could handle this one at home on my own, yeah, brave I know.) UGH that was NO HELP to me whatsoever, so my darling child SCREAMED for 4 hours straight until I finally found a small little container in the very back of the medicine cabinet that had some burn cream in it. Of course if any of you have ever USED burn cream before, you know that it HURTS LIKE H*** when you first put it on, but after a few minutes, it will help with the pain. So of course, applying the medicine to the screaming child's finger with promises that it will make it feel better only made her scream louder, so I held her and we watched veggie tales for an hour until she FINALLY stopped crying and fell asleep. She woke up from her nap in a great mood and hasn't even so much as whined about her finger hurting since then, but it still worries me a little, I am going to keep a very close eye on it.

So, difficult child comes home from school and I said something to her about her straightener and she COMPLETELY BLEW ME OFF!!!! It was SO AGGRAVATING to the point I wanted to smack her (I didn't, but I really wanted to!) So instead, since she didn't seem to want to discuss it, I made her bring me all of her new hair toys and I explained to her that until we were sure she could be responsible enough to NOT possibly burn the house down ( I should mention that the thing had to have been on for at least 2 days, becuase I know that in the last 2 days, she has not had time to straighten her hair). She is NOT allowed to keep those things in her room anymore, and they are only to be used for special occasions or other times that she specifically asks first and it will be done with supervision. This of course really ticked her off and she starts screaming and throwing a horrendous temper tantrum, takes a few minutes, then comes up and offers to help me finish up with the bedrooms. **I don't think that I have ever seen her recover from a meltdown so quickly before and I know that she has never come back and been so nice afterwards. It is usually at least the next day before she is ready to be NICE again, but to recover from the meltdown and be upstairs offering to help and doing it nicely all in a matter of 15 minutes was INCREDIBLE!!! Is this the result of the lamictal?????????? I have not really noticed any other differences since she started taking it, other than today when she had her meltdown. I was just curious if that may have been part of what made her bounce back so quickly, or what?????
 

AllStressedOut

New Member
Oh, I'm sorry about easy child's fingers! Those burns really hurt and lil fingers are so sensitive! A trick I used when my 3 year old pulled her toe nail up (not off, but up) was to put orajel on it before applying anything else. I put the orajel on the top of my hand at the same time and touched my hand with a straight pin to see if it still had feeling. Then once my hand was numb, I knew her foot was. The first day I did this just so I could apply neosporin and a bandaid. Then I used this to help start clipping off the nail. It was completely lifted up with the exception of the small amount under the cuticle. It was sore for weeks, but the orajel is now known by my 3 year old as the "medicine that makes you not feel it." Poor baby!

As for difficult child, that is a very quick recovery time!
 

neednewtechnique

New Member
I love veggie tales, I don't know why, but it solves so many of my children's problems....sometimes I don't even have to play the movie, just singing the SONG fixes everything....lol but today was NOT one of those days, the song wasn't helping anything, but playing the DVD of "Dave and the Giant Pickle" had her laughing and ready to lay down for nap in an hour....so wonderful.
 

susiestar

Roll With It
Maybe you need to monitor difficult child more when she uses the irons too? It is not only a burn the fingers issue, she could have burned down the house!!!!!

So sorry, but it sounds like the kids both had good recoveries (at least for today)

The oragel is a great idea. Never thought about it for pain either. I know here I can get a cream OTC (but behind the pharmacy counter - have to ask) for a mild lidocaine cream. Once I started using it for a skin condition, we even use it for splinter removal!!

Hugs to Mommy and easy child! Way To Go to difficult child for the quick turnaround!!

Susie
 

neednewtechnique

New Member
Exactly!!! I did remove the straighteners and irons from her room and told her that she is only to use them if she specifically asks each time and she must do it under adult supervision. As I mentioned in my post, I KNOW for a fact it has been on for at least two days, so it was surely reaching the point that it could have caught ITSELF on fire and spread to the rest of the house, or even worse, her vanity table is WOOD, so she could have simply caught the table on fire and that could have spread to the rest of the house. As bad as it sounds, it is kind of a good thing that my easy child discovered it, as much as I hate her being burned, but I think that having a small blister on her fingers is small in exchange for possibly being seriously hurt in a house fire!!!

The burn cream I used on her finger is Lidocaine, but the problem wiht Lidocaine is that it often times will make the pain worse for a few minutes before it makes it better. I don't know why that is, and as adults, we are prepared to handle that, but for a three year old who is trusting mommy saying that "this will make you feel better" and the second it goes on, the burning gets worse....I am sure she was not only in pain, but also confused and upset that it made it worse. And having to wait a little bit for the medication to work, I am not sure she is old enough to make the connection that although it hurt worse at first, the medicine WAS what made it better.....

And as a side note, for anyone who asks, at least for now, I would SWEAR by the Lamictal!!!! We have only been using this medication for a short while, but it seems to be working wonders already and with NO SIDE EFFECTS AT ALL!!!!!!
 

trinityroyal

Well-Known Member
Sorry you had such a stressful time, and sorry about your little one's fingers. But it does seem like your difficult child is doing well.

It's probably best that your difficult child use those hair styling tools under supervision anyway. I have wildly curly hair that I was determined to wear straight all through my teens, and I now have a nasty scar on the top of each ear from causing second-degree burns with hot hair tongs...my battle scars from the hair wars.

Just a thought...

All the best,
Trinity.
 

CrazyinVA

Well-Known Member
Staff member
It may be a moot point if you have already spent money on the styling tools (and are going to be supervising difficult child anyway), but they do make curling irons/straighteners with automatic shutoff. My own straightener has that.

Poor little easy child. I hope the burn heals quickly.
 
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