Band-aid Magic

Last Friday was report card day for the two older ones and I brought along Jacob for the day. Thinking that he was pretty much stable on his feet at his age to walk holding my hand from the car park to the school, he had a small fall just as we were walking along the pavement. He didn't cry at first, he just bent down using his hands to dust of his knee. At that moment I didn't realise that he had accidentally grazed his left knee. I just scooped him up to have a closer look at his knees and saw a small skin graze  with a little bit of blood on his knee. Still no reaction to his knee, he just wanted to look at it and dust it off from his fall. 


I looked at him and asked him if it hurt and with his big round eyes he looked at me and I could see the tears well up in his eyes. I think I started the ball rolling with the word, "hurt"! He burst out into full blown tears and cried while clutching his now sore knee. I  took out a wet wipe and began cleaning up his knee and frantically began to look for a band-aid in my bottom-less handbag. Nothing. I was pretty sure I had tucked away some band-aids somewhere in the side pocket it must have been in some other bag. I remembered now that I had some stashed away in the arm rest of the car. With tears in his  eyes I handed him over to my husband and went back to the car to get the band-aids. They weren't there! So I went over to the teacher's room to ask for a band-aid from their first aid kit. Ok I was generously given 3!
I got back to hubby who was now holding a sobbing Jacob while lining up for our turn with the classroom teacher. All cleaned up and ready for the band-aid I told Jacob that it wouldn't hurt after anymore when I put on the band-aid. Unwrapping and peeling back the paper I placed the band-aid on his knee and all of a sudden the sobbing stopped. It was instant! No more crying! 


Jacob looked down at his knee and touched it. His little face and those eyes started to smile and he pointed to his knee and said "Ouch". I wiped away the tears and he looked again at that magic strip plastered on his knee. It was his first time that he really injured himself where he drew a bit of blood and where he could associate the whole falling incident with hurting himself. And so for a while he was back to his cheery self, amusing himself with his new band-aid, the one that stop the "hurt" and made the pain just go away. He was no sooner wanting to walking along the corridor while we waited for our turn with Ashley's teacher.... back to his old self!


..... Not too long after this those little curious fingers peeled away at the band-aid and he was once again crying his little heart out for mummy. Lucky I had those other spare ones! All plastered again and he was a happy little boy once again. Amazing what a bit a sticky bit of plaster can do, just like magic....


Well, over the weekend he had forgotten mostly about his knee only to have it bandaged up again after bath time and he was back to playing with his toys. I dressed him up in long pants to kind of distract him from his knee and he was fine for the remainder of the weekend up until today when his curiosity got the better of him. Somehow he had managed to climb up on the arm of the sofa and reach out to touch the lamp and got his index finger burnt on the bulb. I was in the kitchen at the time and came out when I heard him scream and his brother calling out to me. He was crying so hard this time and I quickly put his finger in a cup full of ice and cold water to help with the burn. It was a little burn but big enough for him to feel the pain from the heat of the bulb. 

And so it was magic time again.... band-aid to the rescue! After assessing the burn and numerous cups of icy cold water, I dried it up and put on a band-aid on his little finger. He stopped crying instantly and he looked again at his finger and than at me and smiled. It was all better now...um that was until he looked down at his knee and realised that he didn't have a band-aid on it. Bursts of tears and crying fits of pain started up again and I quickly stuck on a band-aid on his grazed knee. It stopped again.... now the funny thing about this is that he was all along looking at his right knee which was not grazed at all. It was actually his left knee that was the one that was injured! He had touched his right knee and pulled up his shorts up to look for the graze on his thigh and not being able to find it he let out a cry. I think he remember the knee when he hurt his finger and to him it was all painful. But isn't it amazing how a little band-aid can fix anything as long as it stays on and doesn't get peeled off.

This isn't the first time magical band-aids have worked for this family. The same thing happened when my daughter was small and at the time 3M had these fluro plastic band-aids. They sold in boxes of a 100 and thinking it would last us a while we didn't mind buying so many. Stock up on it and sure it wouldn't finish so fast. WRONG!! My daughter at age 2-3 went thru a couple of these 100 boxes in a matter of a month. Always wanting one for any little grazed, cut and mozzie bite! Okay the grazes and cuts were ok but we live a tropical country and you are bound to get a bite or two from a mozzie. So we would stick one her and then in a matter of minutes it was off again. Start over again and the whining and crying would stop. In the end we told her that we couldn't waste the band-aids anymore and she would have to go cold turkey. No more band-aids for mozzie bites! It worked it's  little magic here and there and instantly helped put the tears away but only when urgently needed. I'm afraid the band-aid era has started again with this little one and so I'm off to buy that 100 box of band-aids.....


Update!!! I bought on special for RM5.50 a box of 100 band-aids...I set for the next few months:)