My son and I are sitting in an Urgent Care facility. Not a fun way to spend the day, especially after spending hours last night in the Emergency Room with my daughter last night. Unfortunately the flu has found our house. Zoey was running a fever and nonstop crying. Cannon has a fever and puking. With both of them being preemies, they don’t have as strong of an immune system as others. So when they are sick we don’t risk it and get them medical care. Sitting in these waiting rooms has brought back tons of memories of other doctors visits we have had since Zoey was born.
When Zoey was born her lungs, like everything else, weren’t as developed as they should have been. We were playing catch up. Now she was able to breath on her own like a champ but couldn’t fight respiratory issues. So after her NICU release we were referred to a specialist. During our initial visit with her respiratory specialist we had a new corpsman at the military hospital we were going to. She seemed to be a little flustered and she had a higher ranking individual teaching her. Honestly giving her Zoey as a patient was just not fair. Zoey had a horrible fear of doctors and fought as hard as her little one year old self could. Seriously, she was a little beast. Oh she looked adorable but would take that nub and throat punch people. Poor corpsman never stood a chance with Zoey as her patient.
After fighting to get Zoey calmed down enough for them to approach her. I watched in equal parts amazement and amusement as the corpsman attached the monitors to Zoey. I made eye contact with the teacher in the room and gave her a smirk. Of course she saw what was happening and knew it wasn’t going to turn out good. The corpsman looked at the equipment in utter confusion, exchanging glance between Zoey and the equipment. Finally she looked at me and said “ma’am your daughter doesn’t have a pulse”. I said, as straight faced as possible, “of course she doesn’t, that’s her prosthetic.” I then smiled and suggested she use her actual arm. With a complete look of embarrassment, she turns to look at her supervisor who just gives her the look. She then turns to me and says “well that explains it. I didn’t think it felt right.” The rest of the visit went along regularly but I have to laugh when I think back to the whole exchange. I know prosthetics are not normally on children that small but seriously, how could she not tell? I can almost guarantee that she’s never mistaken a prosthetic arm for a regular one again.