When the Baby Falls

At some point, this is bound to happen. Some moms will see their babies fall off a chair, the couch or the bed or even someone else's lap. The baby may fall while he's only a few months old, a year old or already a biggie toddler. Regardless, your baby will experience "the fall"; the one that will send him crying from the bottom of his lungs and send you panicking.

There's no knowing when this "fall" will happen, or how but one thing is for sure: You're not a Bad Mom because of it. Unless you purposely watched the baby fall or simply pushed him/her to fall, well then, maybe you should re-evaluate your eligibility for parenting. Assuming that you're not one of those sadistic, rather selfish and possibly mentally absent people, let's discuss about what you can do when the baby does fall.

THE RIGHT THING TO DO

Don't Panic. Keep calm, keep your shit together and don't ever lose it. Chances are the baby won't be severely hurt so there is no point in panicking, but should the baby be in some dire situation, let me ask you, Would panicking help you think clearly on what to do next? No, it won't. The scenario would end up with you crying like crazy and walking or running in circles saying "I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry" to your baby. This will only distract you from doing the right thing, so do not panic. If the baby gets a lump or injury comfort him/her but as a safety precaution, din't make the baby sleep for at least an hour.

Cold Compress is what you need to apply over a lump to ease swelling. If there's an injury, bleeding or cuts, then what you need is to clean it with a Clean Cloth. In some cases, a baby might become drowsy after having a bump on the head, for toddlers it's okay to let them doze off a bit. During questionable incidents where the baby suffered a rather hard fall, and in the case of infants, Don't Let the Baby Fall Asleep Immediately. It's best if you can observe the baby first for any signs of disorientation or anything wrong with his/her movements. Signs that will indicate that your baby needs immediate medical attention is when he/she is turning blue, has a change in breathing pattern, twitching, vomiting, unconsciousness and extraordinary eye movements.

• WHY you SHOULDN'T PANIC during SERIOUS CASES

Let's look at the worst case scenario: should your baby's head or body part be bleeding, injured or swollen, the best thing to do is find clean cloth, clean water (or ice) and a phone to contact the clinic or hospital. In the state of panic, you won't be able to immediately clean the wounds, tend to swollen parts or even call the hospital (or go there). The precious time you spend on panicking, crying, and not knowing what to do could have been spent on doing what needs to be done. So new moms and fidgety moms, Don't-for the love of your child-Panic like crazy. It's scary but you always have to be prepared, so should ANYTHING BAD happen to your child, SUCK THAT FEAR IN and let your SUPER MOM out! Ladies, there's no room for weaknesses during child emergencies. It's THEIR SAFETY and WELL-BEING versus YOUR EMOTIONAL OUTBREAKS. So choose wisely and choose right.

• WHY you SHOULDN'T PANIC during MINOR INCIDENTS

Now that we have established that, let's get back to the gentler reality of babies falling off places. If your baby is okay, but crying, it will just send him/her signals that something is very very wrong and very very troubling. So, even when baby is feeling okay, or simply frightened he/she will not stop crying because he/she thinks there's still something bad going on and this makes things scarier. Try not to show too much of your emotions in times like this, instead comfort your baby and distract him with bright colored things and toys. During minor bumps, falls and trips, don't react like an overprotective parent. Keep calm and hush the baby a little and then let him/her cry it off or forget.

• SOMETHING you OUGHT to KNOW

Did you know that how a child deals with physical pain like falling mostly depends on how people around him react to it? The more a child sees, hears and senses that there's panic and regret in mistakes, falling, tripping and bumping the more he will be sensitive to it each time. So instead of lingering on the fact that the experience might be painful, let go of the moment quickly and help your child move on to a different moment. This way, he/she won't keep crying about what's already done. You'll be raising stronger children if you let them handle and overcome the pain on their own, at least halfway through it.

THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH A LITTLE PAIN

Falling and minor accidents are not entirely bad for children. They are inevitable, normal and a necessity in building character. Without experiences like these, babies or toddlers won't learn how to care for themselves or walk, crawl and run right. When a child falls of from climbing a small desk and gets hurt, he won't try and climb on it again. If he still wants to climb that desk, he'll find other ways (safer ways) to climb it efficiently, like using boxes or chairs as stepping stones. Babies learn how to walk and stand in the right form and manner based on experience. How? Simple, they try to stand up by pulling themselves up via the crib or mom's arm and when they stumble they re-position their feet and hands until they master the art of it.

Like grown ups learning from bad decisions and life-changing mistakes, babies need to trip, fall off or stumble from time to time. It's not our jobs as Moms to make sure nothing ever bad happens to them, because honestly, that's impossible. Nothing in the world could ever stop a tragedy from happening, if it has already happened. We moms are meant to help them get up, start over and grow stronger. So if baby gets hurt under your watch, try not to be so hard on yourself. The best way to redeem yourself is by helping baby overcome the pain, forget the moment, move on and not focus on your personal regrets. It's not about you, it's about baby, so do what's best for baby.

*the first time my baby fell off he was on a couch and only 3 months old. I swear I just turned for a second to brush off peas from my shirt when I heard that scary Thud! I was alone at home and was harboring a grudge on my husband that time. Not knowing what to do I cried while hushing him and tried to call my husband to come home to check my baby. I tried to keep it in, but as soon as I got my husband on the phone I started crying hysterically, it was terrible. My hubby and I fought over whose fault it was even though our baby was fine. The fight lasted two days but the fall lasted only a second. Based on my calculation, the fight is so not worth it.