Mommiedaze

A Wealth of Information

This morning I was reading through the piles of papers the nurse gave me after my OBGYN appointment yesterday.

You know, information about the hospital, tests I need to have, information about pregnancy.

None of it’s really news to me since this isn’t my first time around the maternity ward. But some of the stuff just struck me as funny.

1. “Avoid lifting more than 20 pounds.” I have a 3 year old that weighs 44 lbs. Three year olds are not easily avoided.

2. “Discontinue participation in all contact sports.” Oh, man! No more women’s roller derby for me.

3. “Notify the doctor if you experience severe swelling of the upper body.” Maybe they should should be more clear about what they mean by “swelling”.

4. “Notify the doctor if you experience sudden weight gain.” Huh?

5. The hospital offers a class called All Day Lamaze. Well, perhaps the monotony and duration of it more closely simulates real labor.

6. A sign of pre-term labor is listed as, “A general feeling that something is not right.” I have that feeling often. Usually when my son is playing in his room, and it’s too quite.

7. On the list of things to bring to the hospital, “A blank cassette tape if you want to make an audio recording of the birth.” The only thing worse than a live video of the birth would be just a soundtrack of me screaming, with out visuals for reference.

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I Guess I’m One of “Those” Moms Now

I really don’t want to be one of those moms who calls the doctor about every little sniffle.

When I noticed this morning that David had a cold it didn’t seem like much. But he woke up from his nap coughing and breathing hard. He said it hurt when he tried to take a deep breath.  I held him for a few minutes, and he cried and cried, saying he couldn’t breathe.

When David was about a year and a half old he had a bad cold that turned into a case of croup that was so serious we had to take him to the ER. After that his pediatrician told us it might be something that would happen often to David when he had a cold, and that it could be an indication that he was developing asthma.

I also waited too long to take David to the doctor once. He suffered three or four days with a double ear infection before we finally went. I felt terrible about that. I know how miserable and painful those are.

So I called the doctor’s office this afternoon and described David’s symptoms to a nurse. She told me to bring him in right away. I packed him in the car and drove the 45 minutes to the doctor. Well, usually it takes 45 minutes. I think I got there in 35 minutes today.

We started seeing this pediatrician when we lived closer to Grand Rapids. And all the doctors in the practice are so great I don’t want to switch. The distance isn’t a problem when we’re just going for check-ups and shots. Today I thought we’d never get there.

Of course by the time we got there David’s breathing was normal. The doctor checked him out. He said David just had a bad cold and a lot of congestion. His lungs were fine. He said everything probably drained into his throat and lungs while he was sleeping, and the coughing was just all of it clearing out. He didn’t even have a fever. I’m sure he had a fever this morning.

The doctor was very kind about it. He didn’t tell me I over-reacted or anything. But I felt silly bringing him all that way for a head cold. And since I didn’t have time to apply make-up, fix my hair or change my stained shirt, I looked silly too.

Well, what’s a mom to do? It could have been really serious. Thank goodness it was nothing. I’d rather feel silly at four in the afternoon than find myself racing a really sick kid to the ER at 3 a.m.

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