How not to sit in a shopping cart.....

Back in early 2004 or late 2003 I can't exactly remember for sure we were shopping at Meijer (grocery chain with clothing and such for those not local). Mike my hubby was with me and we had all 3 of our girls as well. We had 2 carts and 1 was mostly full with food the other had out youngest Becca, 2 years old at the time, sitting in the basket. Can't remember why she was sitting there and not in the seat - could be her other sisters were in them.

We were looking at light bulbs or some such in the hardware section of the store and Becca kept leaning over the edge of the cart. We repeatedly told her to sit and stop doing that. Of course when both Mike and I were equal distance away from the cart she falls out - on her head. We both froze as we watched her fall and I was the first to reach her after. I picked her up and watched her silent cry as the bump grew on her forehead in 5 seconds. Then she started screaming and breathing again and we got my purse, the other kids and left everything else there in the carts. We busted butt out of there to the ER. Mike ended up dropping me off and taking the other girls home once I was back in a room. No point in them all hanging around for a few hours. It took that long because we had to have a CAT scan and the tech had to come to the hospital. It being a Saturday or Sunday they were on call. Then I had to hold her still during that - she did not like it at all. But it showed that she had no swelling of the brain and she should be fine - just some bruising. We were sent home with instructions on giving her pain medicine.

She was fine once we got home and had dinner. Her forehead after a few days started looking like a Klingon forehead from Star Trek and of course being the mom that I am - I took pictures of it. As you can see she at that point was such a camera ham she didn't care what she looked like.



This photo was taken a few days after the one above and you can see how the bruising progressed. Don't mind the coloring on the wall behind her - that's a different story. :)



The best part is my mother-in-law had set up a session to have professional photos taken. I called her and suggested she might want to reschedule because of the bruising. Nope she went right ahead and said "oh a little make-up should cover that just fine." Mind you she hadn't seen the actual bruising at this point but I said ok. Below is a scan of one of the shots taken that day. You can see how well or not the make-up covered her bruising. But again ham for the camera.




Moral - even if your kid is old enough to talk back and throw a fit about sitting in the seat, don't let them sit in the basket if they start to lean over the edge.