I am so sorry. I was responsible for you getting hurt today and I feel terrible. It could have been much worse, but it still isn’t ok that you even suffered at all. I wanted to take you out to play and run a couple errands. I figured we’d stop in the mall across the street and buy you a pair of indoor shoes since you always want to wear mine or mom’s, then we could spend the remaining ride tokens in the downstairs play area. You seemed like you were in a bad mood this morning and have been clingy and showing signs of insecurity lately, despite having much more time with Mom and I recently, and I hoped this would lift your spirits. We got some shoes no problem, although you didn’t want to talk or interact with the sales lady at all. You didn’t even want to let go of the shoe I let you see to ask if you liked it. You only let go once we went to the play area and you say all the rides and games again. You immediately went to a train ride and were excited about the lights. I asked if you wanted to ride and you quickly said yes. I put you on and started the ride. I don’t know if one of your right foot wasn’t properly in the foot rest or if you koved it after I sat you down, but the train hadn’t even made a full rotation and somehow your foot was wedged in between the train car and the center post of the ride. The train has nothing to stop it and it was going to bend your leg around the car with no way of you pulling it out of the narrow gap which really squeezed your shoe. I don’t know what made me notice. I am not sure if I saw it myself or if you made some sound. I just know I suddenly felt an adrenaline blast and knew I had to get your leg out of there asap. The way it was bending was right across the bine below the knee. The train wouldn’t stop and it would break for sure. I tried to pull your foot out first but it did nothing. With the train continuing to put lateral pressure across your leg I didn’t try long before deciding to just completely lift you to straighten your leg over the gap instead of bending back and I could finally tug your foot out. The look on your face was awful. It was a face of screaming in absolute agony except there was no sound coming out of your mouth at all. I just wanted to hold you and tell you you were OK and with those words know that you hadn’t been injured at all somehow, but I was terrified that your leg had already suffered a break. A crowd was gathering as you did start to cry out loud and it just made us both worse. I walked off with you and tried to calm you for several minutes. Finally you did relax and stop screaming when you noticed another ride you like. You leaned for it and I knew it could be a chance to let you at least sit so I could check the leg. It was the merry go round you climbed a lot last time, so I sat you on one of the horses. You continued gasping as your sobs subsided over the next several minutes, but I was able to see there were no visually apparent injuries. I tried to make a game and told you ti baba a couple of times with my hand in front of your right foot. You started kicking me and I finally had some relief. It seemed your leg wasn’t seriously injured. I didn’t want you to get on it just yet and I felt like you still needed to forget what just happened a but more, so I carried you around and gave you a couple more rides on other much safer machines. Still I couldn’t help watching like a hawk. We used the last remaining tokens and finally I knew we had to see how your walking was. I put you down and asked if you want to go to play on the slides. You said yes, held my hand, and we walked back to the neighborhood playground. Seeing that made me feel a million times better, but I was still in such despair that you got hurt I felt awful. It helped a but more to see you running around and climbing the stairs to go down the slide over and over again. There’s just no getting over it completely though. My worst fear has been even having anything happen to you. Even if this was worse you still would have healed, but the fact that you had to suffer anything and I could have prevented it is a terrible pain. I don’t write all this to record a need for sympathy for myself. I would honestly rather forget it entirely. In another sense though, I would want to forget because the terror I felt in the instant of seeing what was happening on that ride will forever remind me to double check things and observe you even more carefully. I know I cannot protect you from everything in life. I damn sure am going to do my reasonable best though. I’ve spent the rest of the day re-checking and watching for any signs of problems and haven’t seen any. I’m still going to check as I go in to lay down soon and will continue to as days go by. I am so sorry. I love you and will do better.