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The Band-Aid Drawer

I was still trying to nail down a morning routine with the kids. I’d have to wake up Ava, give her a bath, get her dressed, brush her teeth, make her breakfast, find her shoes, find her coat and make it out to the bus on time, all the while chasing around an energetic two-year-old boy with a knack for trouble. (It’s no wonder I have to dye my hair out of necessity now!)

After her bath, Ava came to me and told me that she needed a Band-Aid for a scratch on her leg. Exhausted, already crunched for time, and fully aware that when I had given her a bath moments ago there was not a note-worthy scratch, I sighed, continued scrambling eggs in my pan and told her she could find one in the bottom bathroom drawer.

She scampered into the bathroom, then dressed herself and sat down at the table for breakfast.

“Did you find one?” I asked.

“Yep,” she replied. “I got one on.”

Good. Problem solved and we were still on schedule. I didn’t think twice about it. We finished our morning routine. I put Ava on the bus and continued chasing Jake around the rest of the day.

When Ava got home from school, I asked her how her day was. She replied, “Good. Everybody kept looking at my Band-Aid though. My teacher made me show some of the others teachers and stuff.”

I froze and horrifying thoughts filled my mind. Did she have a terrible cut on her leg and I didn’t even take the time to look at it? Was it infected? Who was the teacher showing? Did they report me as a bad mother for not properly tending to her wound? What kind of mother can’t set down her spatula for thirty seconds to find her daughter a Band-Aid? Clearly, I was a monster.

I raced over to her, pulled off her shoe and tugged up the leg of her little blue jeans. I was shocked to find that while Ava, thankfully, did not have a giant cut on her leg, she did have a giant, overnight maxi pad stuck to her shin, with the ‘wings’ wrapped securely all the way around her little calf.

Yes, there was a momentary sigh of relief that my daughter’s health was intact, but that was quickly replaced by sheer and utter embarrassment. I dropped my head into my hands, shaking it side to side, feeling the redness creep into my cheeks, all the while hoping that teachers, of all people, would understand how something like this could occur.

I though about calling the teacher to explain what had happened, but in the end I didn’t. I was afraid that doing so would shatter my hope that things like this happen to children all the time…that teachers see maxi pads covering non-existent wounds on a daily basis…and that every other mother struggles to find extra time and sanity in their morning routine. I decided that it was better to just let sleeping dogs lie and embrace my delusions. In fact, I embraced it so well that I still go to school sometimes, pass the kindergarten room and think to myself, “Yep, I bet one of those little kids has a maxi pad on their leg right this very moment.”

Since that day, I have never asked my children to attend to their own wound care. If the need arises, I learned to stop whatever it is that I am doing and take care of it myself. That was the primary lesson learned here. In addition to that, I took away another, equally important lesson…always keep maxi pads and Band-Aids in separate drawers.

Raised in beautiful Door County, Anna Hastings is accustomed to a small town life. Graduating from UW-Eau Claire with a degree in Psychology, she works as a Program Supervisor and Sexual Assault Victims Advocate at the Sexual Assault Center in Green Bay. Hastings is the mother of two beautiful children and has written her first book about the hilarious things that happen in motherhood and marriage.