Best April Fool’s Joke EVER…

Unfortunately, this next part is not the joke.

My poor, sweet Henry.  How could I have ever considered giving him to the gypsies???

Tuesday, I think it was, this week has become a blur, we had an accident.  An accident that I wish was a joke…  An accident that no mother ever wishes to endure, or even thought in her wildest dreams could even happen.  EVER.

So, the big man has some very stringent potty habits.  Which have been discussed.  As he’s sitting on the potty Tuesday afternoon, just like any other afternoon doing his business in the office, he yells for me, “I POOOOOO-POOOOOOOOOOED!”  Which is code for, ‘come wipe me.’  Hell to the no way am I ready to let that child start trying to wipe his own ass.  The last time he did, it ended very badly for me.  Let’s just say it involved sopping wet poo paper stuck everywhere and water slung all over the place.  Poo-poo water.  Gag.  I don’t care who you are, toilet paper, shit and a 3-year-old in a bathroom with the door shut never goes any way but wrong.  Back to the story…  He yells for me to come wipe him… 

Well, the little man likes to sit on the potty and lean waaaaay forwards for me to wipe him.  And he thinks it’s hilariously funny to wag his little tail from side to side or hop up and down, making it difficult for me to wipe.  I do not think this is as funny as he does.  He also likes to push his butt up off the potty seat, sort of doing a push-up so to speak, with his hands.  I had just said, “Okay, enough with the funny business!  You’re going to fall,” after he had been doing a butt-push-up/fanny wag combination.  And guess what he does…  Falls forwards off the potty.

I asked if he was okay, before working in an “I told you so…,” and helped him back up onto the seat to finish the cleaning process.  Upon approved cleanliness, I exited the office so that he could put his pants and underwear back on in private.  Because getting dressed, after he’s been wagging his dirty butt in your face, is apparently a task that requires privacy.  Forget seeing him take them off, or seeing him naked from the waist down, or wiping his ass for him, those things are quite okay for any old person, even strangers, to witness…  But, covering up the parts you’ve just seen more of than you cared to, the putting the clothes back on part, well, that’s serious business that has to be done in solitude.  Anyway, he never came out.

After a few minutes, I walked back over to that side of the house and called, “Henry, are you okay?  Why are you still in there?” Because I’ve just described how Henry in the bathroom unsupervised can mean bad things…  Bad things that I don’t want to have to clean up, or mop up or use fifteen of my newly folded towels to sop up…  And I heard whimpering…   I opened the door and he’s standing there with this horrified look on his face.  He’s still naked from the waist down and he’s holding his pee-pee, looking down at it.  I ask what’s wrong and he starts SCREAMING.  “IT HURTS, IT HURTS!!!!  SOMEFING’S WONG WIF ME!!!  IT’S BLEEDING!  IT’S BLEEDING!”  He’s trembling all over is seriously faaareaking out.  I had to pry his little shaking hands away from his tee-tee and saw a little strip of blood across the top of it.  Like at the base of it, where it attaches to his body.  It was just a thin little line of blood, almost like a papercut.  Or so it seemed.

I carried him into the den where I could look at it in the light and was asking him what happened…  He just kept screaming it hurt.  So I got a band-aid (Princess Tiana, poor kid.  Probably the last thing a boy wants on his boy-parts…,) some neosporin and a paper towel to blot the blood away.  It took some doing for me to actually get a look at it…  When I did, I nearly fainted.

His little baby tee-tee had literally ripped away from his body. 

I’m still in shock over this.

It had literally just torn away from one side, all the way across the top to the other side.  I hated to do it, but I had to pull the cut open a little to properly assess the damage.  I was hoping for just a tiny little paper cut type deal, since that’s really what it resembled, as it wasn’t bleeding much at all and looked like just a thin little cut…  However, when you examine a paper cut, you do not pull open a gaping rip, and see exposed meat.  It was a lot deeper than you want to see any cut or tear in your child’s skin.  And this was no ordinary cut or tear…  This was his little PENIS.  And it was ripped away from his body.

Oh.My.God.  Oh.My.God.  Oh.My.God.

I somehow calmly and quietly put the Tiana band-aid on across it to calm him down.  I very carefully put on his pants and undies for him and told him to sit down and be very still while I got Sissy and Bubby, that we had to go to the doctor to let them look at his pee-pee.  He was so freaked out that he didn’t even bat an eye.  Normally the announcement of a doctor’s visit invokes panic and tears.  Not today.  He knew he needed to go.  And fast.

The other kids were playing in Avery’s room, I told her to get dressed that we had to run Henry to the doctor, snagged the phone, went out into the front yard, called the Mister and FREAKED THE FUCK OUT.

He said he was on his way home, to just wait on him and we’d take Henry to the hospital.  Although, I had no intention of being the one to handle this once taken inside the examination room, where it might involve sharp objects…  Penis territory is alllllll yours, Mister.  Unless of course, my sweet baby needed his Mommy…  Anyway, I called the pediatrician’s office to see if we needed to come there or go to the E.R.  The lady that answered asked me where the “laceration” was…  “Well, um, it’s on his penis…”  She seriously was silent for like three seconds (the same thing the Mister did…) before finding her voice and saying, “Um…  Okaaaaay…  Could you just hold on for a moment, dear?”  She came back on the line and told me to bring him there.

I met the Mister there, handed over my precious boy and his injury and the Mister ran in the door.  He said he didn’t even have to give them any information…  He simply said, “My wife called…  My son needs stitches…” and before he could get anything further out, the lady said, “Yes, Henry…  We’re waiting on you.” And they whisked him away into an exam room.

After much deliberation and the scratching of heads by doctors, PAs, nurses and the Mister, they decided that stitches right there were not the way to go…  And if they had been, they weren’t even willing to do them.  It would require the hospital.  They had no experience in reattaching penises and didn’t really want to start that day.  A doctor finally suggested glue and that’s the way they went.  They glued his little pee-pee back to his body.

My poor, poor baby.

They said that the glue may not hold properly, they had no idea how it would work…  With handling it during urination, baths, little boy “hardening”, etc….  Just to watch it and we’d play it by ear.  I don’t want to play it by ear.  This is my son’s penis we’re talking about.  I want it attached to his body.  Securely and permanently.  Not sketchily…  They did the best they could and they were super fantastic, I’m not faulting them at all….

While they were in there, we waited patiently by the phone, riding around in the car, not wanting to leave the vicinity of the doctor’s office should he needs his Mommy.  Or if we had to rush to the hospital.

Then the Mister took him to Toys R Us and let him buy whatever he wanted.

I think it’s worth a daily toy trip for at least a month.  Don’t you? 

So, how did Henry nearly detach his wee willy winky, you ask?  Well, it was definitely a freak accident.  Remember when he fell off the potty while wiggling his little (smart) ass?  Yeah, well, I bet he won’t be doing that anymore.  Apparently, it’s a lot easier to rip your wee-wee off than one might think.  When he fell forwards, his little peter was kind of hanging down inside the bowl and didn’t make it over the top of the seat.  He went forwards and it stayed put.  So, the force of the fall and his momentum literally just ripped his body up away from his little penis. 

I know.

He is totally fine now.  The Mister and I are not, but he is and that’s what’s important.  It wasn’t a bad enough tear to cause any permanent damage…  His “stem” and urethra are intact and he will need no further medical attention.  Unless the glue doesn’t hold.  Or if he decides to PICK ALL THE GLUE OFF.  Which, of course, he did. 

That requires another rush to the doctor’s office.  Luckily it was just the surface that came unglued.  It was still adhered down deeper and they actually said it was coming together better than they had anticipated.  Which is scary.  What did they expect?  I’m not sure I even want to know…

So…………..  Now that I’ve set up the Best April Fool’s Joke ever………  At the expense of my poor boy’s dignity and pride…  (Maybe he’ll never, ever read this…)

My cell phone rings today and it’s Henry’s teacher.  The one made of pure gold that I truly need to send on a fab tropical vacation for all that she’s done for my children….  Normally, a phone call from her during school hours does not bode well.  The school knows what happened with Henry since I kept him out of school all week in fear of it being ripped off again…  I had to explain…  And of course I got a few phone calls, first of which was from his teacher and was almost immediately after I had explained the situation to the office.  She even said she’d gladly hold his wee-wee for him while he pees when he got back to school.  She’s a saint.

Anyway, my cell phone rings and it’s her…  I pick up the phone, somewhat reluctantly…  It’s normally to inform me that he’s done something, but there was also the dread that there was a problem involving his boy-parts.  I answer, cringing…  Crossing my fingers that is had absolutely nothing to do with his wee-wee and completely and totally forgetting that it’s April Fool’s Day…

Her, frantically:  “Shannon!  SHANNON!  Oh my GOD!  I don’t know what to do…  I don’t know what to say…  *panic stricken mumbling*  IT FELL OFF!  It just fell off!  Oh my GOD!  OH MY GOD!” 

Me:  *silence*

Her, after a good three seconds of silence:  *snicker*  “Sorry.  I couldn’t refuse.  That set up was just too perfect to not cash in on.”

Me:  “Ha.Ha.Fucking.Ha.”

Her:  *hysterical laughter*

Me:  “You’re right, though, there’s no way you could pass that up.  That was the absolute perfect set up EVER.”

Then we both laughed hysterically together. 

Because you’ve got to find the funny.  Or go crazy.

And that my friends, is the best April Fool’s Joke EVER.  And it’s one of the many reasons I love Henry’s teacher so much.  That she’s cool enough to drink with, cuss with and pull an April Fool’s joke on me about my son’s penis falling off.  When it almost.just.fell.off.for.real.  And that she’s willing to hold it for him while he pees.  Even before he almost ripped it off. 

There is a place in heaven for that woman.  There really is.

Now, hopefully, you will never join me in the experience of your son almost ripping his wee willy winky off, nor will anyone you know or love.  And hopefully, it will not lead to a new phobia that involves me never letting my child shit sitting down and/or slide down a slide on his stomach again.  Because as crazy as this story is, I’ve talked to two other people who know somebody who something similar happened to.  So, it’s not as uncommon as you might think. 

Let’s pray the glue holds.  (And that The Vodka doesn’t run out.)

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