Incompetent…

my sister called me that once before school when I couldn’t turn the hairdryer on.  The word struck a nerve with me… and the next thing she knew, we were rolling around on the floor and my fingernails (and toenails) were digging into her flesh.

Incompetent… naturally, I don’t use it lightly.

But frankly, I can think of no better word to describe Lily’s (former) doctor’s office.

Tues: Lily obviously feels bad and is running a fever.  With some sad family news… I want to get a quick diagnosis and contagious period, so we can go to be with Suz and Lukie B.

Weds: Lily screams HURT every time she tries to swallow or take a drink and is drooling like a rabid animal. We take Lily to the doctor (the yucky, dirty disease breeding doctor’s office with super low claustrophobic ceilings, stained chairs, and a seriously bad sponge paint job. I HATE going… can you tell?)

After a good, long wait, the nurse does a rapid strep test.

Dr. finally comes in, tells us the strep test was negative, barely even looks at her and says she has the flu. They would send the culture off and let us know in the next 24 hours what strain it was and whether or not the Tamiflu prescription would even have an effect.  (please don’t be swine flu, please don’t be swine flu… I KNEW we shouldn’t have gone in to WalMart)

Thurs: two excruciating doses of Tamiflu later, we call to find out the verdict. Funny, they forgot to do the culture. We had to return with screaming child and wait for them to stick a swab up the bug’s nose. She was NOT happy about this. Also, we still had to wait in the waiting room. MOM was not happy about this. Her throat was in such rough shape, that I had a sneaky suspicion it wasn’t the flu.  I made a special request to have them send off the 24 hour strep test. Just in case.

Fri: We call to get the results. They weren’t in yet. They would call us back by 11:00. At 11:30, we call back. The flu results were negative. We asked the natural questions like should we stop giving her the flu medicine, was the strep test positive, what should we do with our miserable child?  The girl had NO clue. She said a doctor would call us back.  Another doctor called us back a little while later, and said to stop giving her the Tamiflu and that the strep test was never sent off.  She had no idea what was wrong with Lily and would need us to come back in to make her own diagnosis. I was not the one receiving this info…. or we would have had a fight on our hands.

Frustrated, I call back to bring our daughter in a THIRD time… and am informed that she can’t be fit in today… one doctor has called in sick, so there is only one working.  I try to keep control of my voice and re-explain our situation and how it is now FRIDAY AFTERNOON and we don’t want to go into the weekend with a sick, miserable, misdiagnosed toddler.  She, then, proceeds to tell me that we can come in and wait and see if she has time to get to us.  LIVID… I inform her that we’ll pass.

Busting into tears, I plead with the other pediatrician in town to fit us in somehow.

 

By 5:30 on Friday afternoon, we have a ‘just in case’ antibiotic prescription and a brand new pediatrician… and a hope for a better weekend. A movie and lunch girls’ day is planned for Saturday with Suzanne.

 

By 6:30, I am ravaged by body aches, a sore throat, and crying fits.

2:00 am, Jeff checks my heartbeat when he finds me laid out on the bathroom floor. If I could have laughed, I would have…. hard.

 

WHY, WHY, WHY?  We stay at home and don’t go anywhere but to the grocery store. Why do we catch this kind of stuff?  I’m totally going to become a germ-a-phobe and I’m totally busting out the old cart cover from now on when we venture to the disease infested WALMART!

 

Sorry for the long, depressing novel. I had to vent, before the rage had subsided. When I stop needing to curl into ball every 2 hours, I’m going to write a review on any site I can find.

 

Here’s poor,sick little B-Bug eating some ice cream on the couch with her dad.