Mom wonder why her baby cries continuously until she finally called the doctor. The home security footage from the nursery of the Evans family captures a scene that is visceral enough to trigger a panic response in any parent who watches it. The time stamp reads 3:14 a.m. on a Tuesday, but the room is alive with a chaotic, relentless energy that defies the hour.

 In the center of the frame, bathed in the eerie grayscale glow of the night vision camera is a rocking chair. Sitting in it is Maya, a young mother who looks less like a person and more like a ghost. Her hair is disheveled. Her eyes are dark hollows of exhaustion. And she is rocking back and forth with a frantic mechanical intensity.

Clutched against her chest is her four-month-old son Noah. And Noah is screaming. It is not the soft rhythmic whimper of a hungry infant. It is not the grunting fussiness of a wet diaper. It is a fullbodied back arching shriek of absolute agony. In the video, you can see the baby’s body stiffen.

 He throws his head back, his face contorted into a mask of pain so intense that he stops breathing for seconds at a time, turning a terrifying shade of dark gray on the monitor before letting out the next earsplitting whale. Maya tries everything. She bounces him. She offers a bottle which he slaps away. She paces the floor, walking circles around the crib, patting his back, singing a lullabi that is swallowed whole by the screaming.

At the Forest Huck AM mark, the footage shows Maya breaking down. She puts the baby in the crib for a moment just to wipe her own tears. her shoulders shaking with sobs. Noah, sensing the separation, screams even louder, thrashing his legs against the mattress. He kicks violently, his feet encased in a cute blue fleece-footed sleeper.

 He looks like he is fighting an invisible attacker. Maya picks him back up immediately, whispering apologies, terrified that her neighbors will call the police, or worse, that her baby is dying in her arms, and she is too incompetent to know why. She doesn’t know that the cause of the torture is right there in the video, hiding in plain sight, wrapped tightly around a part of her son’s body that she hasn’t looked at in 12 hours.

 To understand the nightmare of that night, you have to rewind to the previous afternoon. Noah was a good baby. He slept through the night early. He ate well, and he rarely cried unless he needed something. The sudden shift in his demeanor was jarring. It started at 2:00 p.m. Maya had put him down for a nap.20 minutes later, he woke up screaming. Maya assumed it was gas. She bicycled his legs. She gave him drops. She burped him. The crying didn’t stop. It escalated. By 5:00 p.m., Maya’s husband, David, came home to a house that felt like a war zone. The noise was deafening. “He’s just calicky,” David suggested, trying to take the baby.

 His stomach is probably hard. He’s never had collic. Maya argued, her nerves frayed. This is different, David. Look at his eyes. He’s scared. They went through the checklist. Fever, normal, wet diaper. Changed three times. Hunger. He refused the breast. Constipation. He had gone that morning. Maybe he’s teething,” David said, rubbing gel on the baby’s gums.

 Noah clamped his mouth shut and screamed louder. By 9:00 p.m., the exhaustion had set in. The parents took turns walking the hallway, 1 hour on, 1 hour off. They wore noiseancelling headphones just to keep their sanity, but they could still feel the vibration of the screams in their chests.

 The advice from family was well-meaning but useless. Maya called her mother at 10:00 p.m. “Let him cry it out,” her mother said. “He’s over tired. If you keep picking him up, he’ll never settle. Put him in the crib and close the door for 10 minutes.” Maya tried. She put Noah in the crib. She walked out.

 She stood in the hallway watching the monitor, biting her lip until it bled. Noah didn’t settle. He ramped up. He thrashed so hard he hit his head on the rails. Maya ran back in, scooping him up. I can’t, she sobbed to David. Something is hurting him. I know it. It’s the witching hour, David said, rubbing his eyes. Babies just cry, Maya. The doctor said he’s healthy at the checkup last week.

 We just have to survive the night. But the night dragged on and the cry changed. It became high-pitched, piercing, and rhythmic. It sounded like a siren. By 3:00 a.m., the time of the security footage, Maya was hallucinating from sleep deprivation. She saw shadows moving in the corners. She thought maybe a spider had bitten him. She stripped off his shirt.

 No bites. She checked his diaper again. Nothing. She left his fleece pajamas on because the house was drafty and she didn’t want him to get cold. It was a zipper up sleeper that covered him from neck to toe. It was cozy. It was safe. Or so she thought. At 5:30 a.m., Maya reached her breaking point. Noah had been crying for 15 hours straight.

 His voice was horse. He was sweating, yet his skin was clammy. “I’m calling theemergency line,” Maya told David. “Maya, it’s 500 a.m.” David groaned. “They’re going to tell you it’s collic and to give him Tylenol.” “I don’t care,” Mia snapped. “If I’m crazy, let them tell me I’m crazy, but I’m calling.

” She dialed the pediatrician’s after hours number. Dr. Sterling, an older nononsense pediatrician who had seen everything, picked up on the third ring. Her voice was groggy, but it sharpened instantly when she heard the background noise. “Is that the baby?” Dr. Sterling asked. “Yes,” Maya cried. “He won’t stop. It’s been 15 hours.

 He’s screaming like he’s being tortured.” “Hold the phone up to him,” Dr. Sterling commanded. “Let me hear the cry.” Maya held the phone to Noah’s red, tear streaked face. Noah let out a jagged, breathless shriek followed by a long whimpering inhale and then another sharp scream. Dr. Sterling listened for 10 seconds.

 “Maya, take the phone back,” the doctor said. Her voice was no longer groggy. It was alert. That is not a collic cry. Collic is a protest. That is a pain cry. Something is hurting him right now. I checked everything, Maya insisted. I checked his temp, his tummy, his ears. Strip him, Dr. Sterling said firmly. Completely naked right now.

 I stay on the line. Maya laid Noah on the changing table. She unzipped the fleece sleeper. “Okay, he’s naked,” Maya said. Noah was still screaming, kicking his legs. “Check the fingers,” Dr. Sterling said. “Look closely at the tips.” “Is there a hair wrapped around them?” Maya checked. “No, fingers are fine.

” “Check the penis,” the doctor said clinically. It happens. Look for a hair. No, Maya said, checking. He’s fine there. Okay, Dr. Sterling said. Check the toes. Maya moved to the feet. Noah was kicking violently. It was hard to see. He’s kicking too much. Mia said, “David, hold his legs.” David came over and pinned the baby’s knees down.

 Mia looked at the feet. The right foot looked normal. Pink wiggly toes. She looked at the left foot. She gasped. “Oh my god, what is it?” Dr. Sterling asked sharply. “His toe?” Maya choked out. “The middle toe. It’s It’s purple. It’s huge.” The middle toe on the left foot was swollen to three times its normal size. It was a dark, angry, angry purple bordering on blue.

 It looked like a grape ready to burst, and cutting deeply into the flesh at the base of the toe, almost invisible because the skin had swollen over it, was a thin, dark line. “It’s a hair tourniquet,” Dr. Sterling said immediately. A strand of hair, probably yours, got inside his footed pajamas. It wrapped around the toe. The more he kicked, the tighter it got.

 It’s cutting off the circulation. Is he going to lose the toe? Maya screamed, panic washing over her. It looks dead. “We need to get it off immediately,” Dr. Sterling said. Do you have a pair of small manicure scissors or a seam ripper? I have nail scissors, Maya said, her hands shaking so badly she dropped the phone.

 David grabbed the phone. I have them, he said. Tell me what to do. You have to slide the blade under the hair, Dr. Sterling instructed. But be very careful. The skin is swollen, so the hair is buried. You cannot cut the skin. If you can’t get under it, you need to go to the ER right now. Maya grabbed a magnifying glass from the drawer.

 She shone the flashlight from her phone onto the toe. It looked horrific. The hair was a single long strand of Maya’s dark hair. It had wound itself around the digit four times. It was sliced deep into the soft flesh. The toe was cold to the touch. “I can’t do it,” Maya sobbed. “I’m shaking too much. I’ll cut him.” “I’ll do it,” David said.

 His face was pale, but his hands were steady. He knelt down. Maya held Noah’s leg with a vice grip, pinning the thrashing infant. “It’s okay, Noah,” Maya cried. “Daddy’s going to fix it.” David took the tiny scissors. He tried to slide the bottom blade under the hair. It wouldn’t fit. The swelling was too tight.

 The hair was embedded. “It’s too tight,” David said, sweat dripping off his nose. “I can’t get under it.” “Use a needle,” Dr. Sterling said over the speakerphone. “Slide a dull needle under the hair to lift it, then snip.” David ran to the sewing kit. He grabbed a needle. He came back. The baby was still screaming, a sound that tore at their souls.

 David slid the needle along the skin. He pushed it gently into the groove where the hair was biting. “Please don’t hurt him,” Maya whispered. David leveraged the needle. He lifted the strand just a fraction of a millimeter. He slid the scissor blade into the tiny gap. “Snip!” [snorts] The tension released instantly.

 The hair unraveled. David used tweezers to pull the strand away. It came off in a coil, stained with a tiny bit of blood and dead skin. The reaction was almost immediate. Noah didn’t stop crying instantly. The toe was still throbbing, but the pitch changed. The agonizing highfrequency shriek dropped down to a sob.

 The panic left his eyes. He took a deep breath, his first real breath in hours. Thecolor of the toe didn’t change right away, but Maya touched it. It’s getting warm, she whispered. The blood is coming back. Dr. Sterling stayed on the line. “Is the hair off?” “Yes,” David exhaled, collapsing onto the floor. “We got it.

Monitor it,” Dr. Sterling said. The color should return to pink within an hour. If it stays purple or if the skin looks black, go to the ER, but you likely saved the digit. They hung up. Maya sat on the floor holding Noah. She rocked him. Within 10 minutes, the exhaustion overtook the pain. Noah put his thumb in his mouth.

 His eyelids fluttered. And then he fell asleep. He slept for 12 hours straight. Maya didn’t sleep. She sat by the crib, staring at his foot. She watched the angry purple fade to a bruised red, and then by morning to a healthy pink with a thin red line where the hair had been. When she looked at the footed pajamas lying on the changing table, she felt a wave of nausea. It was such a simple trap.

 A single loose hair had fallen into the laundry, or perhaps dropped from her head while she was changing him. It had nestled into the toe of the fleece sleeper. When she zipped him in, the hair found his toe, and as he kicked, which babies do constantly, the hair wound tighter and tighter. Because he was wearing footed pajamas, she couldn’t see it.

 Every time she checked his diaper, the feet remained covered. Every time she picked him up to comfort him, his kicking tightened the noose. The collic was torture. The teething was gang green setting in. The security footage of that night is hard for Maya to watch now, but she keeps it. She keeps it as a reminder. She shared the story in a parenting group a week later.

I thought I was being a good mom by keeping him warm, she wrote. I thought I was crazy for calling the doctor at 5:00 a.m., but always check the toes. If your baby is crying and you don’t know why, take their socks off. The post went viral. Thousands of parents commented. Some shared their own horror stories of hair tourniquets.

 Others admitted they had never heard of it. One comment stood out to Maya. It was from a paramedic. We call it the hidden tourniquet. I’ve seen babies lose toes because parents thought it was just a bad night. You trusted your gut. You didn’t listen to the people telling you to let him cry it out.

 That phone call saved his ability to walk properly. The next day, Maya went through the house. She vacuumed every rug. She cleaned the laundry with a lint roller and she threw out every single pair of footed pajamas. From that day on, Noah wore socks. And every night before bed, Maya performed a ritual. She kissed his head. She kissed his nose.

and she inspected every single one of his 10 tiny toes. We often think of medical emergencies as loud, dramatic events, car crashes, falls, fevers, but sometimes the most dangerous threats are silent, microscopic, and hidden inside the very things we use to keep our children safe. A mother’s intuition is the only diagnostic tool that matters when the science doesn’t make sense.

 If Maya had listened to the advice to let him cry it out, the morning would have brought a tragedy instead of a recovery. If this story of a mother’s instinct and a hidden danger shocked you, let us know in the comments. Did you know about hair tourniquets? Like and subscribe for more lifesaving stories and parenting warnings.