Saturday, September 13, 2008

You can tell by the scream...

whether the kids are playing, fighting or severly injured. Each scream has a distinct sound that mothers pick up on when their kids are very little.

So, I'm sitting at the computer earlier and I hear a scream. It wasn't a normal playing scream, then it got more frantic and it became obvious in milliseconds that someone was injured.

I ran to the back door and couldn't see Michael, Rachel or the neighbor boy. I yelled, "MICHAEL, COME HERE, WHAT'S WRONG!?" He came running and screaming from the woods. Thoughts of sticks puncturing flesh crossed my mind. Awful thoughts of what injury could cause this tribal scream to come from my son.

Then, he yelled, "BEES!!!" I worked frantically to get his clothing off of him when I realized that the bees were on his shorts, his sandals and they were being very persistent. While doing this I was looking for the neighbor and seeing Rachel had not been affected, I brought poor naked Michael into the house. He was able to tell me that the neighbor had run home.

I got Michael into the tub and let him run cool water over the stings while trying to calm him and assess his condition. He was terrified. Rachel was so concerned for him. She stuck right by us. We could find 10 stings from his buttocks to his ankles. I gave him a Benedryl and put Calidryl lotion on them. He was calm enough to sit on the couch with ice packs by this time. I called the neighbors who were going through the same thing with their son.

I can bet that Michael will never go into those woods again. We aren't sure where the bees came from since Chris couldn't find a hive. They could have been in the ground or in a dead tree.

He seems to be fine now. The boys are back together and playing Star Wars Leggos on the Playstation.

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