Nasty little burn

M burned her arm on the popcorn popper last night.  It's a pretty good little burn, somewhere just around a grade 2, with some puffy swelling and redness (though no blisters).  We had our backs turned for a split second, so we didn't see it happen, but then suddenly she hopped off the chair and said Rae could finish up popping the popcorn, and she went off to her room.  She didn't cry out, no tears, just ran off to her room.  We're not sure if she was embarrassed, or thought she'd get in trouble because she "did something wrong", who knows.  After a couple moments of finishing up the popcorn we checked in on her and sure enough she'd burned her arm.  When we made a fuss over it (more from her not telling us than the actual burn, I think) and got it under some cool water, that's when she started to cry, like now she had permission to.  After several minutes of cool water we put some ointment on it and covered it with a gauze pad, held in place with Dora band-aids because we didn't have any medical tape.  A little Motrin and some TLC (not to mention popcorn and cartoons) she was feeling pretty ok, though we could tell it still really hurt.

We asked her a few times why she didn't say anything, but she wouldn't say.  So rather than getting on her about it, we impressed upon her how important it is that she tell us when she gets hurt, so that we can take care of her.  With her arm under the water, she kept nodding 'ok'. Rae also had a first-aid/emergency brochure that she got from her most recent first-aid/CPR class, and M was fascinated by it.  Kept looking at the pictures and asking questions.  We talked about calling 911 (and pushing the green button) on the cell phone if mom or poppa ever get hurt, and what she should say during the call.  We've actually been talking about that all summer (I think they did a safety thing at school, with McGruff the Crime Dog), and she knows her address, and what to tell the 911 operator.  Rae and I think having this little accident really drove the point home.  She was fascinated by the big color instruction brochure.

So, hopefully it'll get better soon.  No doubt she'll have the gauze on for the rest of the week and weekend.  Hopefully it won't scar, or if it does it shouldn't be permenant (I've had 2 such burns and the scars faded eventually).  She certainly knows to be a lot more careful around the stove, and to let us help her if she gets truly hurt.  At least it wasn't a huge price for the lesson.

And for those of you wondering if this was a lesson for us as well, more of a reminder, really.  M's been making popcorn with us for some time now, and we've repeatedly talked with her about safety around the stove, so this wasn't a new thing for us to do.  It did, however, tell us that everything's a learning opportunity, and that we cannot repeat the lessons too many times (even if "I get it, mom!").