Scariest moment as a mom

Just before Easter, I experienced the scariest moment I have had to date as a mom.

The twins were napping and Jacob was "helping" me make dinner.  It was an easy dinner - taco soup.  All I had to do was brown some hamburger meat and then add it to the crockpot with the other ingredients I already had in there.  Jacob (like so many other times he's in the kitchen with me) wanted to be on his little step-ladder so he could see what was going on.  As I cooked the meat, I kept telling him it was hot and not to touch.

Once the meat was done, I turned off the burner and I picked up the pan I told Jacob again in a firm voice, "This is HOT.  DO NOT TOUCH."  As I started to dump the meat into the crockpot I saw Jacob lean onto the burner I had just used.

I screamed.

I think when Jacob first jerked back it was because I screamed.  Then he started to feel the pain.  I grabbed him and started running his hands under cool water and he kept screaming.  To him, something was hurting his hands so he kept trying to rub them onto his shorts to get whatever was causing the pain off his hands.  His hands blistered and peeled almost immediately.

I called Justin at work to ask what I should do and tell him to leave work (but with over an hour commute I couldn't just sit around waiting for him to get home).  A few minutes later someone from church called, but I didn't answer because I wouldn't have been able to hear her anyway.  A few minutes after that another lady from church showed up at my house and minutes after the lady who had tried to call showed up as well.  One of them stayed with the twins while the other drove Jacob and me to urgent care.

Jacob screamed for probably a total of an hour and a half until the painkiller he was given at urgent care kicked in and he fell asleep.

I was so grateful that help showed up so soon and that Jacob's burns weren't too severe.  Have you ever had a bad burn though?  Those are the worst - I understand why he wouldn't stop screaming.

We had to keep his hand bandaged for a while until it finally healed (his left hand was burned far worse than his right hand).  At first he didn't like having the bandage on his hand because it was different, but it didn't take long before he always wanted it covered.

This is the best picture I have of Jacob 's bandaged hand

And if we are going to look for positives - I'm pretty sure that Jacob understands now when we tell him something is hot.