"Hello, Poison Control"

Am I the only mother who uses Poison Control every 18 months or so? I wish I could go back and see the log on our family(you know they have one!) and see what all the reasons were. Daniel(5) bit a glow stick in half one night in the car and accidentally drank some of the *juice* which burned his throat, we called from a pay phone. Jessica(4) ate a gladiola tuber she dug up in my garden...yes, the whole thing. Micah(3) drank Windex. I know I have called at least 5 times since having children. It's free, quick, medical advice, what can I say? If I call the family doctor, they inevitable tell me to come in, thus $80 later am sent home with a "no threat". Poison Control will tell you the straight truth, immediately, for free. That brings me to my story.

My Grace. My dearest Grace. She is a very obedient little girl, but still has a sneaky side that rears it's head every so often. My heart is still pounding. Elijah was given Tylenol today because he is cutting two very nasty eye teeth and has been perfectly miserable. Grace saw me take the bottle out, dose Elijah and she asked for some. I told her "no" and explained why. She seemed intrigued by the red liquid, but satisfied with my explanation. The Tylenol went back in the cupboard and on went the day.

About a half hour after putting the little ones to bed, Jessica found the child-proof bottle of Children's Tylenol...OPEN and mostly gone in the upstairs bathroom. We woke Gracie up and after coaxing the tired thing, she admitting she drank it. "Did you give any to Elijah?" "No, Mommy, I didn't, I drinked it." She drank at leeeast an 1/4 of the 4 oz bottle. Go ahead Google "child Tylenol overdose" It is SCARY!! After glancing at a couple pages I grabbed my syrup of ipecac and went for the phone.

I found the number for Poison Control, picked up the phone and....no dial tone. I messed with the plug and...no dial tone. I ran to the upstairs phone...no dial tone. I ran out the the addition and keeping myself in control told Paul that I needed to call PC because Gracie drank the Tylenol from the child proof bottle. He quickly came out to the main phone box on the house and sure enough, our lines were dead! What are the chances of that!!! Our cell phones rarely reach a tower from our property, but I ran to an open space and did get ahold of PC on one bar. A sweet young man quickly took down her weight, age and amount she drank and said she was safe. Ahhhhh, thank you Lord....Her count, he figured, was around 62 and we would have had an "emergency" on our hands if she hit 150, so we were well within a safe range. Phew.

3yr old opening a child proof bottle of Tylenol + dead phone lines = My first gray hairs? 

Poison Control usually calls back in the morning(isn't this sad, I know these things!) to make sure everything went well. That is one public service I am very thankful to have! Thank you Lord for your tender mercies given to our inquisitive little children and the Daddies and Mommies who love them so dearly!