Today I experienced one of the most traumatic things in my entire life. Mind you, I have witnessed my wife going through 18 hours of labor -and before all the mothers say "YOU didn't go through 18 hours of labor," watching your wife is not at all easy (you ladies say some pretty mean things that you have selective amnesia about later), I have lived through one of the worse natural disasters in history with Hurricane Katrina - which included living in a house with 15 people, 5 animals, 1 bathroom and zero electricity, and a pregnant wife for a few days until we decided to try to get to my family in Florida, I have been through death and loss of family members and ministered to families in the same circumstances. But today had to be one of the worse I have ever gone through. I took both of my girls to the doctor for their check ups...BY MYSELF.
Before you roll your eyes, I have always taken the girls their doctors appointments, and I have no problem doing so. Janel is not a fan of doctors, doesn't like shots, and since my schedule is more flexible, I have taken the girls to the doctor all but 1 time in the combined 6 years of parenthood. Today was different then all the other times I have taken them to the doctor.
This was Madison's 1 year appointment, so I expected for her to be getting shots - smartly, I gave her Tylenol before going into the office to help off put the pain and fever - what I was completely unaware of was a new "fun" activity they do at this check up. On top of the 3 regular shots they gave her, there was also the finger prick tests for blood hemoglobin or something like that (I was in a daze when she was trying to explain it because it was the last thing they did, and I had already seen 4 needles, of which I am not fond). This test consists of them stabbing Maddie's finger and squeezing out 2 tubes of blood. Of course this caused my beautiful child to turn into the spawn of Satan and scream continuously for the next hour.
Morgan, I thought, was going to be easy as pie. A 5 year check up is normally just to make sure she can hop on one foot, speak full sentences, and is toilet trained. This would have been excellent, if Janel and I had not been concerned about her petite size. If you know Morgan, you know that she is small for her size and has actually been getting picked on at school for this - please pray for her and us as we work through this in her life. I asked the doctor about it, and she decided to do a thyroid test. Sounds great, except for the part where they draw 3 viles of blood from Morgans arm. Imagine this, I am holding Morgan in an MMA body triangle, with my arm over her shoulder across her body to keep her still. A nurse is holding each arm to keep them still, another nurse is holding a screaming Maddie, and a nurse is holding Morgans legs between her knees and is about to stab Morgan in the arm. If you were not counting, that is 5 grown adults to control 2 children that combined weigh 52 pounds. It was a freaking circus in that room.
The best part of all of this was, I paid $50 in co-pays in order to have the pleasure of the experience. You should have seen the eyes of the kids that were in the waiting room as we walked through after we were finished. I believe I heard one of the parents saying "see what happens when you misbehave at the doctors office," but I may be wrong.
I love my children, and to see them go through that was difficult for me, but I know that it needed to happen. So as the band Nazareth tells us "love hurts, and scars, love wounds and marks" but sometimes it is for the better.
Until next time.
No comments:
Post a Comment