Just Another Day at the Park...

...Or so we thought! We took Lucas to a really awesome park a few weeks ago that had a play ground that would be the object of many a child's dream come true. Unfortunately not for Lucas. He was having a grand old time playing on the smaller side of the play set when I decided to take him to the big kid section - did you ever notice they usually have a "small child" side and "big child" side of a playground? I had noticed this many times at parks I used to take my little sister to and now that I have taken Lucas; but it never really dawned on me how important this feature can be. They usually design the play equipment to have some sort of obstacle that only the more developed gross motor skills can achieve. I should mention that I have been to a park that didn't really have an obstacle preventing the little ones from getting to the big kid section and it scared me when I saw Lucas about 1.5 stories up with a free fall right at his arms length (a fire engine pole to slide down for the big kids looks like certain death for a 20 month old).

I should take a side note to say that I had recently taken Lucas to the dr. for a well baby checkup and discussed at length how I think Lucas seems a little behind in his gross motor skill development. She agreed that he may be behind but that she attributes it to his cautious nature. He really does sit back and take it all in before he joins any party and maybe this is a good thing. I had just always heard "once they walk, it won't be for long because then they run and never look back." But Lucas has been walking for 6 months now and still does not run, has a hard time going up hills or managing ground texture changes, he doesn't pull himself up onto furniture or attempt stairs standing up. I enrolled him in a kids gym class when we went to the park...

So, I was feeling like Lucas just needed a little guidance to help him overcome the gross motor skill development obstacle and then he could go down the really awesome and big slides on the other side of the play set. And when we got up there, he was scared. I didn't know what to do - I didn't feel confident to hold him and go backwards through the obstacle (maybe I need to work on my gross motor skills) and I couldn't convince him to go down the slide on his own. What I decided to do I will wish forever that I hadn't done. I put him on my lap and went down the slide. 1/3 of the way down the slide turned to the right, his leg popped over my thigh and got wedged between my leg and the slide. 2/3 of the way down the slide turned to the left, and his leg broke. The sound of his screaming still brings tears to my eyes when I remember it.

The dr.s say this happens all the time when the weather is warm and as soon as I told our friends and family people started coming out of the woodwork about how they knew someone who this happened to or they read some article just last week about how common this injury is at this age. While all of these reassurances have helped me get through this guilty feeling they do not take away the memory of that scream and the knowledge that I caused it.

The good news is he has mastered the gimp walk and has been sleeping normally. He is still super cute and I have learned that children really know their limits and deserve to have that respected.