The splinter

First, here are some things you need to know about my Sammy girl:

1. She hates having her hair brushed and constantly says, "Ow! Ow! You're hurting me!"

2. She hates having her hair washed and constantly says, "Ow, Mom! You're pulling my hair! And you got water in my eyes! OW! That hurts!"

3. She's very klutzy right now because her legs and arms are growing way too fast, so she's constantly falling down or flailing her hands against walls -- and then she cries.

4. She HATES taking medicine and will do just about anything to get out of it: gagging, crying, hiding, debating, bartering, refusing to open her mouth, etc.

5. She is physically unable to hold still while I clean out her ears with Q-tips, and she makes hysterical giggling noises every time.

Now, in addition to all of this, Sam also had two mosquito bites very close to one eye, making a large part of her face puffy; and a mosquito bite on her other eyelid, making that puffy. So after her bath Tuesday night, I gave her a good dose of Benadryl so it could work while she slept.

I started on the splinter extraction by plopping her onto her bed, propping her leg up on a pillow and trying to pull it out of the bottom of her foot with tweezers.

The hysterical giggling began, as did the constant squirming and the first pleas of "just don't do it, Mom, it'll be OK, I promise!"

After a few minutes, I enlisted Daddy's help. I snuggled her against me -- by which I mean I tried to hold her tightly enough to keep her from moving -- and Daddy wielded the tweezers.

No luck.

By then, she was yelling, so we took her downstairs since Noah was trying to sleep. Daddy got a needle because the splinter was embedded so deeply. I got an ice cube and tried to numb the spot first.

Sam cried at the ice cube: "Ow, Mom! It's too cold. It's TOO COLD! OW! IT'S HURTING ME! TAKE IT OFF!"

We tried the same configuration: Me holding, Daddy wielding, Sam screaming bloody murder. I was truly grateful more than once that we don't live in a townhouse or apartment building, because I'm positive somebody would've called the police and reported that we were torturing her.

A few more minutes of trying, and then Daddy and I switched spots. Sam -- now fully feeling the Benadryl and wanting to pass out from lack of oxygen -- screamed and sobbed the entire time.

Finally, FINALLY, I managed to coax a large chunk of it out. About 30 seconds later, I extracted the last little bit, and then I grabbed my Sammy and hugged her.

And hugged her, and hugged her, and hugged her and hugged her.

Her eyes were red and even more swollen, her nose was completely stuffed with snot and she was exhausted. I carried her up to her room, then did the one thing I thought would cheer her up.

I got out the gauze patches and the medical tape.

We wrapped up her foot.

We put a gauze pad over Baby Lion's back and wrapped medical tape around him.

We put a gauze pad on Baby Tiger's food and wrapped medical tape around it.

We put a gauze pad over a chunk of Blankie that I had to trim off and sew earlier in the week, and we strapped some medical tape on it.

We put a gauze pad in Daddy Lion's armpit to cover a hole that needs to be stitched and wrapped medical tape around it.

And by then, she was all settled. She snuggled her bandaged family of stuffed animals and scooched down under the covers. We kissed her good-night and walked out of the room.

In the morning, I was waiting for her to give me a speech about how I should never, ever do that to her again, OK? Cuz it just wasn't nice that we held her down and yada yada yada ...

But all she said was, "Boy, I went right to sleep last night! Some nights I don't go to sleep so fast and I have to play for a little bit. But last night I just laid down and went to sleep."

I smiled. At least she has some sort of happy memory to balance out the torture.