Doctors
I managed to do only one thing today, and that was laundry. Well, two things, if you include taking Theo to the pediatrician this morning. His several-day low-grade fever persisted with a rash all over his face and torso today. The look of the rash was unfamiliar to me so I took him in. Surprisingly, he had a fever while in the doctor’s office – that almost NEVER happens to me. Usually our luck runs that while in the doctor’s office, the child in question has no fever. Our regular pediatrician was booked, so we saw one of the other doctors. Her demeanor was overly accommodating: thanking Theo for hopping onto the exam table, assuring me that I “did the right thing” by bringing him in. Negative strep culture meant just a virus with instructions to go home and wait it out.
Lately I find that when I am transported back to my OBGYN’s office, I wonder what was going through the doctor’s mind as he looked at the ultrasound machine. Is that odd? He knew that I was petrified, given my history, as I lay on the exam table. The doctor back in September had faced the ultrasound machine away from me after the nurse failed to find a heartbeat on the doppler. This doctor faced it in my direction; he obviously began the exam thinking that nothing was wrong. Seconds before he gave me the news as he continued to look at the screen, I gave a half-hearted joke “This is why I hate these appointments so much,” knowing, yet not knowing, the information that was about to change my world yet again. Did he mentally prepare to give me the news, taking a few seconds’ pause at the machine? Or is that something that happens with enough regularity that he knows how to deliver the news in the most compassionate way possible?
My therapist reminded me yesterday that it has only been a little over a week since our loss. It simultaneously feels like it just happened, and also happened so long ago.
As I put away the kids’ laundry, I was forced to look at their current sizes. Theo complained this morning that his shoes are too small. Quentin will soon be four years old, so I contemplated bringing out the next-size-up clothes (but decided to save that task for another day). I had to further ignore the totes and totes of carefully labeled infant clothing that still takes up space in their closet. Clothing I was planning to sort through in the upcoming months. Instead I had to focus my attention on my two growing children. Ignore that ache from not planning for a baby to join us.
Quentin has his winter program at school tonight. Before he left this morning, he asked me “Is that what you’re wearing to my program?” while eyeballing my uniform of leggings and a sweatshirt. I responded yes, this is what I’m wearing. “Can you put on a necklace? Where the Wild Things Are.” I had to laugh at his fashion sense that adding a necklace would constitute “dressing up.” And good choice of the accessory, so I’ll make sure that I meet his request tonight.
