To the Doctor!

Tristan woke up in the middle of the night last night claiming his ear hurt. We gave him some Tylenol and hoped he had just slept on it wrong. My gut told me this wasn't the case, but I remained hopeful. Sure enough, his ear hurt worse this morning. So I made the dreaded call to the doctor's office to get him an appointment.

We got there and waited. Luckily there weren't that many kids there and I think we only had to wait 4 hours instead of the usual 4 days. Or so the kids seemed to think of the wait.
We got into the examining room and waited. The kids read books and complained. At the same time .. they're multi-talented like that.


Our beloved doctor finally came in. He was the pediatrician to both myself and Justin along with our siblings and my cousins. I don't always agree with him but I trust him.
He began looking Tristan over. It was an ear infection. Left ear was nasty and right ear was getting it too. There could have been no infection yesterday morning, this was a quick acting, nasty little bug. He patted Tristan on the belly and announced that he "has the crud."
He looked at me and asked if he'd been sick. I told him he'd had a cold and was taking a while to fight it completely off. He's like me, things can linger. He looked at me and asked how long he'd had it.
"I dunno, a while?"
"How long?"
"A couple of weeks?"

I hate that look. I really hate that look. It's that look that says "What kind of mother are you that you let your child be sick for weeks and didn't bring him to the doctor?!?" ... Um .. because he wasn't really sick the whole time??
That look says he doesn't believe me. I hate that look.

About the time that Tristan was 7 months old he had gotten a bad diaper rash which meant I had to go to the doctor.
It was a bad day from the beginning. He had peed through his cloth diaper the night before and I had bathed him clean in the sink. Apparently though I didn't get his head well enough and by the end of the day he .. well, smelled like a pee-head.
The appointment was late in the day, meaning we had a long, long wait. He was hungry, not feeling too happy, and whiny ~ it was the international melt-down hour. My pee-head son was NOT his happy-go-lucky self.

The nurse called us back and we went into the examining room. I had to undress him down to his diaper to be weighed and measured. I took him to the scales. Pee-head sat there a little more content. It was then the nurse noticed the scabby-like marks on his back.
"WHAT ARE THESE!?!?"
"Bite marks??"
~umm .. I think she about fell over at this point. I'm pretty certain her mouth did hit the floor and her eyes popped out of her skull~
"Look, he has an older brother who is 2 1/2. He keeps biting him. We're working on getting him to stop" I tried reassuring her and explaining the true situation to her.
"Oh. Yea, I had a biter too." Now she was talking to me like the mom she truly was.

So we go back into the room and wait for the doctor. Not our beloved doctor, another doc we'd never seen who was on call and seeing people who were making the last minute appointments.
He came in and looked the diaper rash over.
"How long has he had the rash?"
"Well, he's had the rash for a while, but it started getting worse so I brought him in."
"How long has he had it??"
"I dunno, a week or two??"
There was that damn look again.
And my kid had healing bite marks on his back.
And he had Pee-Head.
And, as the doctor soon told me, he had a "regular" diaper rash that had then gotten infected. He gave me a prescription for some cream. I went out of there, my little Pee-Head tightly in my arms, as quickly as I could. I was certain they would call Social Services.

I hate those damn looks. I don't like running to the doctor immediately over every little thing. Which means we give things the unthinkable .. TIME to heal on their own (or with a little a little over the counter medicine, etc). But, when I finally take him into the doc, they give me that damn look. I also NEVER know the EXACT moment my kids get sick. Sorry, but I don't keep that stuff jotted down.

I hate that damn look.

Husbands & Wives & Married Lives OR Gorillas & Geese & How they Co-Exeest

Our oldest son turned 7 last week. This was the first year we held his birthday somewhere other than home (or a relative's house). He had a pirate-themed pool party at the Y. We were REALLY limited on how many people we could invite and so we opted to have a 'Family Only' pizza party later that night.
It was during his party that I realized something.

I'm sure this really comes as no shock to couples that have been married decades, but it really hit home to me during this party at the Y.


It started when we decided it was time for cake. I was going to be the one lighting the candle & presenting the cake, but first the kids needed to be rounded up & put in chairs. I asked Justin to help.

See the confused question mark?? It sounds like a simple request doesn't it? This is about the time I began coming to my above stated conclusion.

What he really heard out of me was this. I had to repeat my request a couple of times while he stood there looking at me like I was honestly just squawking and quacking at him. Finally it seemed to translate. Either that or the kids had heard me repeat the request enough that they finally went and sat down. ~ This may have been his agenda all along. I think I have just discovered something else.

I had to tell him that my mother wasn't going to magically appear and handle these things, that I needed him to step up. I got another ape-look from him.
I began trying to cut the cake and again asked him for help. I reminded him again that my mother wasn't going to magically appear. Same ape-look. He finally told me that "that's why the other ladies are here." ~ Yes, he really DID say that.
As if on cue, some of the other mothers came into the kitchen, one after another to help me. The first came in and I thanked her and griped about my husband's inability to realize that he should be helping. The second mother came in and immediately asked if anyone else's husband was driving them up the wall because hers sure was.
It was then that I totally got that expression about women being like a gaggle of geese. We worked together getting the cake and ice cream out to everyone all the while squawking about our husbands when we were in the kitchen.

We managed to make it through cake, ice cream, and presents and to the pool. It was there that I realized that most ALL marriages are comprised of a gorilla and a goose.
We were sitting around the pool, some of us in it with the kids and some sitting on the edge relaxing. One of the other mothers was watching her husband in the pool with their toddler. He was letting the boy stand alone in the water and she was worried that he would/could easily fall into the water and go under. She began calling to him to please hold onto the baby. That the baby was in the water and could fall. That the baby was too young to be standing alone like that. Her husband just looked back at her with a big, goofy grin on his face.
Being married to a gorilla myself and being able to view the situation (as opposed to being in it) I immediately realized what he was thinking.

He had told me earlier that his job was to keep the baby from drowning. I'm pretty sure all he heard from her, at least given his big grin, was that he was doing a good job keeping the baby from drowning.

It's all about Gorillas & Geese and How they Co-exeest. ~ Yes, I know it is a typo. I'm trying to rhyme so quit being a douche.