Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Mom of the Year

There have been several occasions in the course of parenting when I feel like I've earned the "Mom of the Year" Award. It's not an award that's hard to earn, you just have to lovingly neglect your children, do a lot of self diagnosing, and utilize maximum doses of Tylenol and ibuprofen.


For instance, when Alex was in 5th grade, she was spending a lot of time on the basketball court and she was playing a lot of softball. She also had lots of heel and foot pain. Everyone knows that heel and foot pain in that age child is Sever's disease. And the treatment for that is... ibuprofen. See? Self diagnosis and ibuprofen.
Except that several months later when I did decide to take her in to see the doctor I learned that she has a heel spur on each foot, which accounted for most of the pain, and the orthopedic makeup of her feet was quite askew. So askew, in fact, that they were affecting her ankles, knees, and hips. The physical therapist was concerned about even making orthotics that would correct it completely because she was afraid that would cause more pain, so she corrected them as much as she could comfortably and added a little extra cushion to the heels to help with the spurs. She has been wearing the orthotics faithfully for three years and...little to no more heel pain.


Another example? Last year Anthony decided to join the Cross Country team at his high school. They had practice every day after school where they would often run 4 miles a day. Soon after the school year started, he began having chest pain. Horrible chest pain. So bad he thought he had broken a rib and it was puncturing his lung. I took him to the doctor, they x-ray'd him, checked him out, and sent us home with probably a pulled muscle in his chest. So, what does a good momma do? A momma that's in the running for Mother of the Year? She gives him ibuprofen and sends him on running. He continues to run about four miles a day for another week and came home almost every day and went to bed. That running really wore him out! Eventually, the poor boy started running a fever and I finally felt like I may be out of my realm of expertise. I took him to Children's Hospital and found out he had pneumonia, which ended his cross country season before it started. Since when is ibuprofen not the preferred treatment for pneumonia?


Which leads me back to Alex... Last year (yes one year ago), Alex and a volleyball team mate collided. She had immediate pain and even had to sit out the remainder of the practice which she's never had to do. She even finished a batting session after breaking her thumb when she was 10 just cuz she didn't want anyone to see her cry. After a little ibuprofen the night of the collision, she was ready to play again the next day. The shoulder, though, remained a nagging source of pain throughout volleyball season and all through travel softball season. The pain was a constant companion through middle school softball season last fall but was bearable when we taped it down tightly. Next, came a little self diagnosing and thinking that a couple of months rest would definitely make it better. After two months of rest and no relief I finally decided to take her to the orthopedic doctor, who after a very thorough examination and questioning, determined she had a SLAP tear of her left shoulder. He ordered an MRI to confirm his diagnosis, which leads us to today...



Any activity you do with Alex ultimately turns into an interesting, entertaining event. Some of her quotes from today.

"This gown is very unstylable."
"I'll take that camera away from you if you take my picture."
"Do they have these gowns in kid sizes? This one's way too long."
"You didn't say anything about needles." (And I had kept that piece of information to myself.)
"I don't like this hospital. There are no elephants or kites on the walls. The walls aren't pink or green or yellow."
"The nurses don't have teddy bears on their uniforms. Or kitties. What's wrong with these people?" (She's used to going to Children's Hospital.)
"He told me it would feel like a bee sting. Why would he tell people that?"
"Why do I have to sit in this wheelchair?"
"The MRI wasn't too bad but I got bored after about ten minutes." (She has the attention span of our puppy.)
I wish I had written them down - there were many more Alexisms.
After the arthrogram the doctor came out and told me she didn't even flinch when he injected the contrast. He said the girls are a lot tougher than the football players that come in there.
We'll get the results from this test next Wednesday, and if his first impression is correct, she'll need surgery which we can schedule at our convenience. Our earliest convenience is probably going to be after this softball season, and after try outs for the high school team, and after she decides if she wants to play high school volleyball. I think I feel another award coming on. Posted by Picasa