Feel like the worst parent ever - 2-year-old badly burned hand

[AveAtqueVale]

Just posting because I feel so awful and don't really know what to do with myself. Staying in a hotel for a few nights with a log burner in the room. Wasn't intending to light it until the kids were in bed, but then had the bright idea I'd warm up their pyjamas on the fireguard while they were in the bath, as they'd only be in the same room for a few minutes while they got ready for bed and DH and I would be right there.

Completely forseeably, in two and a half seconds with DH and I both only feet from him, the two-year-old decided to stick his hand onto the glass of the burner. Both of us saw him about to do it and got to him a millisecond too late. Despite 20 minutes under a cold tap started immediately he's got two giant blisters on his palm, and absolutely sobbed his heart out for about forty minutes earlier until we were able to get ibuprofen as well as the calpol we'd brought with us down him. He kept begging me to fix it and didn't understand why I couldn't.

It looks so painful, and I feel so sorry for him and so guilty. WHY did I not just leave the damn thing off?! FFS. Not only was it a totally forseeable accident, I'd specifically thought about it beforehand and dismissed the risk, and then WATCHED IT HAPPEN.

I'm supposed to be getting some sleep while DH stays up to give him his next calpol dose but I just can't switch my brain off. I've never felt so totally inadequate and shit as a parent.

Also a doctor. If there are blisters doesn't that make it partial thickness, not superficial? And on the palm is high risk for scarring and contractures. Needs to be seen, I'm afraid.

As a registered nurse I've had burns myself and it's very painful I'd be at the ER

I am also very surprised a doctor would think 2 blisters on a 2 year old's hands do not need to be seen at a&e. Anyone can tell you how potentially serious it can be.

He's just woken up for a bit and is loads better than last night painwise, and has dropped off again no problem. One of the blisters has gone already and is just red now, but the other one looks a bit grim, so we'll go to A&E once he wakes up properly to get it looked at.

@jellyjellyinmybelly very good advice, thank you .

And thank you to everyone else as well for the handholding and the poking to get him seen.

you didn't take him last night. That would raise a safeguarding concern here.

A burn like you describe left someone I know with having their finger amputed layer in life. Similar age to your dc when he did it, it never regained full movement and he chose to have it amputated on his teens because it caused a lot of problems.

Glad you are off to A and E.

Let the hotel know, they need this in their accident book and ideally should be getting a guard.

Accidents happen. They are just accidents. Every one of us has either misjudged the potential for an accident - just see how frequently there is a ‘my baby rolled off the bed, I feel awful’ post - or even worse, lots of us have inadvertently injured our child (personally I was trying to get past dd in a doorway when she was about 3yrs, knocked into her, she bumped her head on the edge of the doorframe, cue lovely big egg on the head and guilt for a lifetime - she’s in 6th form now and I still remember it! )

I’m glad you are taking ds to get the burn checked out, nasty things burns. Try not to beat yourself up, it was just an accident born out of an attempt to do something lovely (cosy pyjamas).

Hope he’s ok op. Children are so fast when they want to be!

I hope he's seen quickly, and glad it's not so painful now.

I burnt myself a few weeks ago on the oven shelf and the pain took my breath away. It's surprising how much it hurt.

I agree with letting the hotel know they need a fire guard.

I'm shocked as you are a doctor you didn't take him to make sure his hand was okay?
My friends little boy got a huge burn blister and he got rushed to the nearest children's burn unit.

Hope he is okay and accidents do happen however your response to it actually concerns me and I actually hope your not my doctor as if my children's hands were burnt with blisters I'd want help not calpol!

Don’t beat yourself up, accidents happen.

Did you take him to A&E?

Try not to punish yourself. Accidents happen, and this could have been so much worse. It sounds like you did all the right things. You didn’t neglect him in any way . My eldest son, now 34, tried all sorts of ways to injure, or worse, possibly kill himself, when he was tiny, including climbing on a garage when he was 2, nearly drowning when 5, electrocution, age 7!! Plus many other less taxing incidents. We were always right there, or nearby. With the electrocution attempt, I was downstairs. I’d very stupidly given him a plug and cut off lead for his electrics box. You’ve probably guessed, he plugged it in, but not before taking the back off the plug! He decided to poke around the backless plug with a screw driver. He wanted to see the electricity!! Thank the Lord, the screw driver had a plastic handle. So he shorted out the whole house, and his hair stood up on end, with smoke coming out of the socket, but that was it! I felt so bad, but I couldn’t have known, and that’s life. We do what we do. Just learn from it, and then it won’t have been in vain. Your son is fine, and will continue to be. I am inclined to think he perhaps should have it checked out though. I know you’re a doctor, and probably hate the idea of going to A/E, I was a nurse, and would feel the same, I always avoided it if I could, but he could get infected, and because he’s growing, it may restrict his hand movements. Hope all goes well for you🤗

Quick update: went to A&E, some debate over whether to dress it but when the nurse observed him climbing the cubicle curtains like a monkey she seemed to think it might be a good idea. He's been making attempts to get it off so currently has a sock safety pinned (internally) to the sleeve of his jumper to stop him getting at the dressing, and his jumper safety-pinned to his trousers to stop him just taking the jumper off. He's very cross with me about it and has told me I'm no longer his best friend, but otherwise is fine, and hasn't needed any painkillers since this morning.

@endlessstrife if I can get him to 34 in some semblance of one piece I'll be a happy woman. When the nurse asked him why he touched the fire he said it was because I'd told him not to, in a tone that suggested that that was an obviously irresistable provocation . He's two and a quarter and has already had more a&e trips than I've had in my entire life. His older brother has never been so I'm relatively sure it isn't just my parenting...

Ah fun times toddlers aren't they

Glad to hear it's sorted OP. Good luck.

Sounds like a good outcome, OP.

I don't know, someone should start a thread on these accidents, we've all had them.

I, apparently, told my mother I had eaten some staples. As I was normally a very truthful child she had no option but to believe me. None were ever found...

I have one of those OP, more A&E trips than the rest of the family put together! I remember breaking down in front of the plastics consultant at Alder Hey who told me he also had a three year old that split his own lip open when running around 'being a ghost'. Mine had scaled the table and jumped off 'being Superman' in the time it took DH to get from one side of the room to another!

Glad he's on the mend, even if he is annoyed!

It’s not your parenting, my other three children have always been fine. I must say though, they probably watched their older brother, and thought, I’m not doing that, it’s not worth the repercussions!!

My sister was a kid like that too. Stitches galore. It happens. Glad he's happier now op. Don't beat yourself up.