Off we went to the doctor's office for Zac's physical for school. The kids seemed calmly resigned to this. we have been to the doctor before, no big deal. This is a relatively new pediatrician, We had been in over the winter with a bout of pnemonia, and that has been it until now. We don't need to go there much. Emma had her physical and they both got updated immunizations last week. They knew there were no more shots coming, just Zac's physical then off to the grocery store. So this is what went down:
We get there and sit calmly to be called. I am reading some book to them.
"Zachary?" The kids turn toward the door. The redness eminating from my son's eyes should have been a giveaway, but I thought it must have been a trick of the light.
We are led to a room and that is where it all happens.
Let me just summarize it in point form:
1- Zac gets up on table and lies down stays very still. Is told not to lie down "Your not sick!" You are healthy! look at you!" Zac gets tickled. Big mistake. Proceeds to wiggle, shimmy, climb, hop up and down on the thing. Will not listen. Falls off and face plants on the floor. Is angry, not hurt.
2-Emma sees her moment and makes for the surgical gloves. She is not very stealth, Is immediately busted and begins to whine. Loudly. Yet somehow they get a surgical glove each and beg for them to be blown up into roosters. I oblige, thinking they would chill out. Nope.
3-Doctor gives book to Zac. Emma sees no book coming for her & whining increases.
Zac, in solidarity, throws the book to the floor because if Emma doesn't get one, he doesn't want one. Doctor widens his eyes in scandal. Both kids are going. They are winding themselves up and things are getting pretty loud.
4-Doctor is unimpressed with my family. Tells me that I need to restrict Zac's diet because he is chubby. (You want to know who is chubby by the way? This doctor is chubby -just saying.) Is tappity -tapping away on hs computer, no doubt firing off a plea for help to child services while simultaniously making notes on all this.
5- Kids are fighting each other over something now and I am attempting to get them to sit down in the chairs. Doctor is observing the breakdown with a teacher's pet-like sneer. questioning their sleep habits. Zac stomps on Emma's Rooster. It pops. She screams.
6- I am temporarily ignoring the doctor as I have suddenly got my hands full of feral children. If we were at the park or anywhere else in the world. I would have gotten them out of there long ago.
7- Zac, who is totally gone by this point, pulls his ninja moves on me and kicks and chops me in a 3.5 year old flurry.
8- Doctor is horrified. He whines, " OOOooooh never hit your mother!" Thank you doctor,
9- I don't remember in what order this all went in, but in the middle of my kids loosing it in the doctor's room, right in the middle of the loudest, whiniest, most aweful part, doctor pipes up with,
"How's discipline working out for you?"
I swear I was just about to join my kids.
I can't believe we made it out of there. The bloody receptionist decided to add a cherry to it all by offering the kids a choice of stickers, oh, and would they like a pencil? Just to give them something more to process and fight about. (She must have heard us in the room, why didn't she hide the damn things?!) Finally they are out the door and in the car and I tell them:
"Know what guys? that doctor was writing down everything you said and did in there. He...wrote...it...all...down."
That was all I needed to say to Emma. Her eyes went very round and she got very quiet. Zac was pretty clueless so I told her to explain it to him.
I called my husband, who was just sitting down to a meeting, little did I know, and because my voice was apparantly so shrill, they all got to hear about the doctor's appointment. Apparantly it caused them to laugh and reminisse.
I got off the phone to hear Emma say to Zac, "So the doctor will Always think we are like that. because he wrote it down. It will be there forever."
Zac: "oh I get it. I thought it was funny, but it actually is not funny."
ding!
Then they both appologized in a very true and heartfelt manner and were sweet and very quiet.
Does anyone else like to look at other drivers? I do this compulsively and sometimes I see someone crying. This day, I was that crying driver. 10 points! I don't like feeling like the out of control incompetent parent. For a good hour I was racked with feeling like I was going to guarantee my kids were going to be fat idiots because I am a terrible mother. That feeling sucks and is best to get past it somehow.
Indignation works. Who is this person who is telling me that my active healthy boy is chubby? He is 3! He is very short! The kid has muscle definition all over him, there just isn't much place for all that to go. And discipline? I could go on all day. Forget it. Sometimes these guys freak out. We are working on that. So is everyone else in the world. I reject a snapshot of their lives as a definition.
Every day we communicate and every day we try. Eventually we will figure it out.
If we don't land in jail first.
We get there and sit calmly to be called. I am reading some book to them.
"Zachary?" The kids turn toward the door. The redness eminating from my son's eyes should have been a giveaway, but I thought it must have been a trick of the light.
We are led to a room and that is where it all happens.
Let me just summarize it in point form:
1- Zac gets up on table and lies down stays very still. Is told not to lie down "Your not sick!" You are healthy! look at you!" Zac gets tickled. Big mistake. Proceeds to wiggle, shimmy, climb, hop up and down on the thing. Will not listen. Falls off and face plants on the floor. Is angry, not hurt.
2-Emma sees her moment and makes for the surgical gloves. She is not very stealth, Is immediately busted and begins to whine. Loudly. Yet somehow they get a surgical glove each and beg for them to be blown up into roosters. I oblige, thinking they would chill out. Nope.
3-Doctor gives book to Zac. Emma sees no book coming for her & whining increases.
Zac, in solidarity, throws the book to the floor because if Emma doesn't get one, he doesn't want one. Doctor widens his eyes in scandal. Both kids are going. They are winding themselves up and things are getting pretty loud.
4-Doctor is unimpressed with my family. Tells me that I need to restrict Zac's diet because he is chubby. (You want to know who is chubby by the way? This doctor is chubby -just saying.) Is tappity -tapping away on hs computer, no doubt firing off a plea for help to child services while simultaniously making notes on all this.
5- Kids are fighting each other over something now and I am attempting to get them to sit down in the chairs. Doctor is observing the breakdown with a teacher's pet-like sneer. questioning their sleep habits. Zac stomps on Emma's Rooster. It pops. She screams.
6- I am temporarily ignoring the doctor as I have suddenly got my hands full of feral children. If we were at the park or anywhere else in the world. I would have gotten them out of there long ago.
7- Zac, who is totally gone by this point, pulls his ninja moves on me and kicks and chops me in a 3.5 year old flurry.
8- Doctor is horrified. He whines, " OOOooooh never hit your mother!" Thank you doctor,
9- I don't remember in what order this all went in, but in the middle of my kids loosing it in the doctor's room, right in the middle of the loudest, whiniest, most aweful part, doctor pipes up with,
"How's discipline working out for you?"
I swear I was just about to join my kids.
I can't believe we made it out of there. The bloody receptionist decided to add a cherry to it all by offering the kids a choice of stickers, oh, and would they like a pencil? Just to give them something more to process and fight about. (She must have heard us in the room, why didn't she hide the damn things?!) Finally they are out the door and in the car and I tell them:
"Know what guys? that doctor was writing down everything you said and did in there. He...wrote...it...all...down."
That was all I needed to say to Emma. Her eyes went very round and she got very quiet. Zac was pretty clueless so I told her to explain it to him.
I called my husband, who was just sitting down to a meeting, little did I know, and because my voice was apparantly so shrill, they all got to hear about the doctor's appointment. Apparantly it caused them to laugh and reminisse.
I got off the phone to hear Emma say to Zac, "So the doctor will Always think we are like that. because he wrote it down. It will be there forever."
Zac: "oh I get it. I thought it was funny, but it actually is not funny."
ding!
Then they both appologized in a very true and heartfelt manner and were sweet and very quiet.
Does anyone else like to look at other drivers? I do this compulsively and sometimes I see someone crying. This day, I was that crying driver. 10 points! I don't like feeling like the out of control incompetent parent. For a good hour I was racked with feeling like I was going to guarantee my kids were going to be fat idiots because I am a terrible mother. That feeling sucks and is best to get past it somehow.
Indignation works. Who is this person who is telling me that my active healthy boy is chubby? He is 3! He is very short! The kid has muscle definition all over him, there just isn't much place for all that to go. And discipline? I could go on all day. Forget it. Sometimes these guys freak out. We are working on that. So is everyone else in the world. I reject a snapshot of their lives as a definition.
Every day we communicate and every day we try. Eventually we will figure it out.
If we don't land in jail first.
Switch doctors. Although, it makes for a wonderful story. Actually, could you maybe schedule another appointment next week and then blog about it?
ReplyDeleteThis too shall pass...
Oh dear heart. The great thing about you Karen is that that first January visit I had with you I remember thinking WHAT AN INCREDIBLE mother you are!
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