It was a nasty spill.

On Saturday morning, I took Sloan and Beau to Millwood Park, a relatively quiet area with a playground, tennis/basketball courts, a wading pool, and a splash pad tucked away in a corner near the intersection of Trent and Argonne. I didn’t dress my kids in swim gear but that didn’t stop them from gravitating straight to the splash pad.

A game soon developed. Sloan or Beau would press the censor button in the middle of the splash pad and they would run as fast as they could to clear the pad and enter the grass before the gushing water could drench them. Before you knew it, three other kids had joined and everyone seemed to be having fun. That was until Beau tripped before he could make it off the splash pad and face planted right on the cement.

Beau and Sloan would activate the splash pad censor and would run off the cement before the water would gush out.

As a parent, it was one of those things you see in slow motion. The moment his face met the concrete, I dashed over to him and picked him up. I immediately examined his mouth. His top gums were bleeding but thankfully his teeth were all there. I began to clean his mouth as a mom gave me some wipes and Sloan ran to our car, retrieved an old cup, and filled it with drinking fountain water. I then took note of his other wounds. He was scuffed up on his nose, above his lip, and on his chin. Although hysterical at first, he calmed down after about five minutes and was back to playing the same game again. In fact, Sloan was more spooked than her wounded younger brother.

The fall left Beau scuffed up and bruised.

Beau’s face was in a pretty sorry state that whole day and it looked even worse when he woke up the next day. Let me tell you, it made going to mass very interesting. Which brings me to the three things parents deal with after a child is scuffed up.

1. Sympathy for their child – Beau looked like a boxer that got knocked out in the last round. Seeing his handsome face all bruised and the pain that accompanied his transformed mug made me feel really bad for him.

2. Hope for a speedy recovery – Just a couple days removed from his incident, I am crossing my fingers that his face heals—and hopefully quickly! He already has scarring from another bloody incident a couple years ago and the last thing I want are more “battle wounds.”

3. Fear of accusations – Every parent jokes about CPS coming after them when their child has a visible wound. With Beau’s hideous scuffs, I could only hope that good-intentioned people wouldn’t jump to any conclusions when we unapologetically allowed him to still show his face (pun intended) in public after the incident.

Watch for an update on the healing of Beau’s face in a future Thursday Rundown. Don’t Blink.