Take two Motrin and call me in the morning...

I was reminded, reading my friend Sarah's blog, that a couple of months ago, we were getting ourselves ready one lazy Saturday morning when Jack apparently wandered into his bathroom, climbed up onto the stool, took the bottle of childrens' Motrin off the sink and drank out of it. For all of you that don't have children, I am not lying when I tell you that this all happened in less than 60 seconds. Children might be small, but damn they are fast. Someone other than yours truly had left the top off the Motrin when plying Jack full of his nightly ibuprofen (it's for the teeth people) the previous evening.

When I walked into the bathroom the bottle was empty. I thought reallllllly hard and felt 90% certain that there had only been a small amount left in the bottle before Jack got to it. The only reason I remembered was because I had made a mental note to stop at the Walgreen's to get some more because God forbid we go a night without it. Although I was considering waiting it out because the odds seemed decidedly in my favor, Billy freaked me out enough to call poison control. Besides, my own hideous guilt was beginning to get the best of me.

If I'm being perfectly honest, I was not keen on calling Poison Control because, first and foremost, I was loathe to admit, on what is surely a taped line, that I was a negligent parent who left her child unsupervised long enough to have a Motrin cocktail for breakfast. I was so paranoid that Poison Control would forward my info to Child Protective Services that I actually refused to give them my phone number when asked. Also, I really didn't want them to tell me to take him to the hospital because that surely would have ruined the day. For many reasons.

The man who answered was actually very nice and non-judgmental. At the very least he did a great job pretending. When I explained what happened, he said "So ...worst case scenario, he drank a whole bottle of Children's Motion?" I told him that the worst case was 1/4 of the bottle (which was being generous) and he literally snorted and said "Oh you're fine." I must have made some kind of noise that suggested disbelief because he quickly regained his composure and told me that he would check his charts using Jack's weight. As it turns out, at Jack's weight (approximately 25 pounds), you'd have to drink TWO WHOLE BOTTLES of Children's Motrin before there are any side effects, other than an upset stomach of course.

Now, I feel certain that the job of Poison Control is not to let you know how much rope you have before you hang yourself, but man is that a relief. Just tuck that little tidbit away. I guarantee it'll come in handy...