exam room roadkill

“Please be patient. Your call will be handled by a licensed nurse in the order in which it was received. We apologize for the long wait time, but our advice nurse is providing quality advice for other callers at this time. Please do not hang up since you may lose your place in line. Thank you for choosing us for your child’s pediatric health care.”

*          *          *

“How’s her eating?” he asked.

“She’s not,” I replied. “And she LOVES to eat.”

“What about bowels? Anything green or black?”

Eck. “Um, no.”

“Is she sleeping?” He continued.

“Yes, but not well.”

“But she is sleeping?”

“Yes.”

“Through the night?”

“Yes…”

“So basically you brought her in because she’s crying.” The big, blonde doctor whose name I always forgot wrapped the stethoscope around his neck and rolled his chair backwards.

“NO. I mean, yes. But this is the end of three weeks of sickness, not the beginning. Look at her face – she looks like she ran into a truck. She’s ALWAYS happy. But she’s cried nonstop for three days and…”

“Well, I can’t find anything wrong with her. Her ears are fine, her throat is fine, her nose is fine, her breathing is fine.”

“But something is wrong.” I said.

“If the crying persists and she poops green or black bring her back in and we’ll run some blood tests.”

“But…”

“Thanks for coming in.” He stood to his feet and shook my hand. And then he left.

I stared after him.

I turned to the girls. They started screaming again.

*          *          *

“Please be patient. Your call will be handled by a licensed nurse in the order in which it was received. We apologize for the long wait time, but our advice nurse is providing quality advice for other callers at this time. Please do not hang up since you may lose your place in line. Thank you for choosing us for your child’s pediatric health care.”

*          *          *

TWO started screaming on Saturday and continued until Monday afternoon, which was the earliest we could get in for an appointment. I was worried. She never cried without reason.

So we finally got into the office and sat for like twenty minutes in the waiting room. Which sucked. And then they moved us into an exam room which was a relief until they left us there for another forty minutes with three torn picture books and no TV. That sucked harder.

By this time ONE was rolling around on the doctor’s “chair” and singing on the top of her lungs about how she wanted to go home and watch TV. And TWO was screaming and flailing and trying (without success) to get on the chair with ONE. At this point ONE decided that the chair was actually a steamroller and that TWO would make an attractive pile of roadkill.

The screaming intensified.

I shut down.

And then pulled out my copy of  “Twilight.”

I just vanished into the plot-less world of Edward and Bella when the doctor finally walked in…

*          *          *

“Please be patient. Your call will be handled by a licensed nurse in the order in which it was received. We apologize for the long wait time, but our advice nurse is providing quality advice for other callers at this time. Please do not hang up since you may lose your place in line. Thank you for choosing us for your child’s pediatric health care.”

*          *          *

ANSWER: 60

QUESTION: How many times did this recording play while I waited on hold trying to get a sick appointment for my extremely sick one-year-old who dragged herself after me throughout the house screaming?

The good news was that I finally got someone on the phone who granted us a sick visit.

The bad news was that I didn’t catch who the appointment was with. But as long as it wasn’t the big, blonde doctor whose name I always forgot, we’d be fine…

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