#10
Yet more hours of our lives spent in the germ infested emergency room. Bleah.
We went for a long walk yesterday, did some shopping and set home again the long, meandering way. No ducks for us today, no sirree, we went to Target and bought me some...I think you rockstars call them wife beaters which, what the fuck? You crazy kids. Anyhow, in the Antipodes, we call them singlets and in lieu of purchasing anything classy or pretty or that could be seamlessly put together with a tailored pair of trousers and an elegant pair of shoes, I got some more shit that goes with nothing except my trackie dacks worn with my clapped out old running shoes.
Sidebar. When someone tries to sell you a pair of Adidas Supernovas instead of your handy dandy Brookes Glycerines, take the laces out of the Supercrappies, ball them up and stuff them down the the salesperson's throat, would you? Much obliged, thankyou.
So we bought my two new high fashion pieces, and toddled off home the long way because it's been almost eleven months now, and "I've just had a baby" doesn't cut it anymore as an excuse for my wobbly bits.
Daniel loves a walk. He leans back in his stroller seat, elbow out one side with his feet propped up on the bumper in front, and chows down on a teething rusk. He'll usually get a bit antsy half way through, and that's when I pick him up and carry him for a bit, before cramming him back into his seat and loading him up with a new, not yet chewed to a choke risk stump, rusk. Other than that mid way interlude though, he kicks back and enjoys the ride with barely a peep coming out of him. Yesterday, he was so mellow he didn't even have his half way mark oxytocin crisis, and I was all glowing with pride at my laid back kid.
I got him home though, and discovered that he was super mellow because he was super running a temperature of around 38C. By 8.30, his temerature had reached 38.8C, after dipping to almost normal again some time in between, so I gave him some paracetamol (which you guys call acetaminophen, which is a totally awesome word, by the way) and called the ER for some advice, which was that anything above 38.5C needs to be seen by a doctor, stat. Fabulous. I hate the ER. It's full of germs and besides, if he isn't dying, I feel like I'm abusing the system and the system takes sooooooo looooong to use because people do abuse it because they're too tight to pay to see their own GP. Probably don't even have a GP because they save their money for beer and cigarettes by going to the ER. We have a socialised health care system here, and people are always bitching about it, about how it takes so long and bla bla bla, and my answer to that is, Really? And why do you think that is, Einstein? Here's an idea, next time you get a sniffle, go to your own fucking doctor and pay the damn gap instead. When we see a private doctor instead of going to a government funded, public hospital, we don't even have to pay the full doctor's fee as medical care is generally government subsidised anyway. We pay what's known as the "gap", which is the difference between what the doctor charges and what the government pays for. It's usually way less than the government subsidy, but people complain about that too. God. What happened to being responsible for oneself? I mean, look at me. I'm perfect and all so despite being poor and shit, I have ALWAYS made sure I have health insurance so that I'm never a drain on a system that really should be utilised with more social conscience. When I had Daniel, I could have opted to go in as a public patient and not paid a damn cent. Instead, being perfect and all, I chose to use my private insurance and went into the same hospital as a private patient and so, paid $250 for the experience. Because I give a damn about the future of this country. Booyah!
Aaaanyway, since the stupid nurse had told me over the phone that my kid needed attention, I packed him up and raced into the city. It's only a fifteen, twenty minute trip that time of night, and by the time we were halfway there, Daniel was singing and chatting and daa daa daa-ing away in his car seat, and was totally not the limp little rag that worried me so for most of the evening, which meant that when we were triaged, he go the label 'healthy little boy'. I thought it would be better if we just went home, and the triage nurse was all ".....", and the nurse who took his PERFECTLY NORMAL vitals a half hour or so later was also all "......", and throughout this whole time Daniel was all "whooppeee!" and I was all wishing he'd pretend to be a little more under the weather than he was, and feeling guilted out at even considering going home before someone took a look at my chipper little guy, while feeling guily for needlessly bringing my chipper little guy to the ER in the first place. That last one had me feeling guilty for my treatment of him and the system. Argh. So we waited until midnight to see a doctor who then told me that we probably didn't need to come in at all anyway.
I should be grateful that the nurse was so conscientious, but four more hours of our lives spent in that place means I'm not quite there yet with the appreciation thing. As far as ERs go, this is probably one of the nicer ones, with a huge wide screen TV even, donated to the department by a local credit union, which would have been awesome had someone though to put on a dvd instead of the not-for-children crap that was on last night, bitch, moan, etc.
After seeing the teeny weenie doctor for long enough for him to tell us our visit was a waste of time, I took Daniel home and put him into bed and by 4.30am, he had another fever. I stripped him off and poured the requisite 1.5 mls of parecetamol down his protesting gullet, and off he went to sleep again. We didn't wake up until about 10am and he's been a bit feeble all morning. Not sick or anything, just clingy and sad. He's napping now, and it remains to be seen whether the fever will come back again. My money is on that it will.
Things I haven't got around to telling the internet which are kind of pertinent right now:
He has an appointment with a private pediatrician to work out what in fuck to do about his iron levels, but as that's not until January, so I've made another one with the pediatrician at the hospital, and we see him on Tuesday. Daniel doesn'tfit any of the risk factors for iron deficiency, the only explanation my doctor (who isn't actually my doctor, but as he's currently only working two days a week and is booked up until Daniel turns twenty seven, we're the Medical Centre sluts, and will take on whoever is available) has is that it might be because of all the damn infections he's had this year.
And that's all folks.
We went for a long walk yesterday, did some shopping and set home again the long, meandering way. No ducks for us today, no sirree, we went to Target and bought me some...I think you rockstars call them wife beaters which, what the fuck? You crazy kids. Anyhow, in the Antipodes, we call them singlets and in lieu of purchasing anything classy or pretty or that could be seamlessly put together with a tailored pair of trousers and an elegant pair of shoes, I got some more shit that goes with nothing except my trackie dacks worn with my clapped out old running shoes.
Sidebar. When someone tries to sell you a pair of Adidas Supernovas instead of your handy dandy Brookes Glycerines, take the laces out of the Supercrappies, ball them up and stuff them down the the salesperson's throat, would you? Much obliged, thankyou.
So we bought my two new high fashion pieces, and toddled off home the long way because it's been almost eleven months now, and "I've just had a baby" doesn't cut it anymore as an excuse for my wobbly bits.
Daniel loves a walk. He leans back in his stroller seat, elbow out one side with his feet propped up on the bumper in front, and chows down on a teething rusk. He'll usually get a bit antsy half way through, and that's when I pick him up and carry him for a bit, before cramming him back into his seat and loading him up with a new, not yet chewed to a choke risk stump, rusk. Other than that mid way interlude though, he kicks back and enjoys the ride with barely a peep coming out of him. Yesterday, he was so mellow he didn't even have his half way mark oxytocin crisis, and I was all glowing with pride at my laid back kid.
I got him home though, and discovered that he was super mellow because he was super running a temperature of around 38C. By 8.30, his temerature had reached 38.8C, after dipping to almost normal again some time in between, so I gave him some paracetamol (which you guys call acetaminophen, which is a totally awesome word, by the way) and called the ER for some advice, which was that anything above 38.5C needs to be seen by a doctor, stat. Fabulous. I hate the ER. It's full of germs and besides, if he isn't dying, I feel like I'm abusing the system and the system takes sooooooo looooong to use because people do abuse it because they're too tight to pay to see their own GP. Probably don't even have a GP because they save their money for beer and cigarettes by going to the ER. We have a socialised health care system here, and people are always bitching about it, about how it takes so long and bla bla bla, and my answer to that is, Really? And why do you think that is, Einstein? Here's an idea, next time you get a sniffle, go to your own fucking doctor and pay the damn gap instead. When we see a private doctor instead of going to a government funded, public hospital, we don't even have to pay the full doctor's fee as medical care is generally government subsidised anyway. We pay what's known as the "gap", which is the difference between what the doctor charges and what the government pays for. It's usually way less than the government subsidy, but people complain about that too. God. What happened to being responsible for oneself? I mean, look at me. I'm perfect and all so despite being poor and shit, I have ALWAYS made sure I have health insurance so that I'm never a drain on a system that really should be utilised with more social conscience. When I had Daniel, I could have opted to go in as a public patient and not paid a damn cent. Instead, being perfect and all, I chose to use my private insurance and went into the same hospital as a private patient and so, paid $250 for the experience. Because I give a damn about the future of this country. Booyah!
Aaaanyway, since the stupid nurse had told me over the phone that my kid needed attention, I packed him up and raced into the city. It's only a fifteen, twenty minute trip that time of night, and by the time we were halfway there, Daniel was singing and chatting and daa daa daa-ing away in his car seat, and was totally not the limp little rag that worried me so for most of the evening, which meant that when we were triaged, he go the label 'healthy little boy'. I thought it would be better if we just went home, and the triage nurse was all ".....", and the nurse who took his PERFECTLY NORMAL vitals a half hour or so later was also all "......", and throughout this whole time Daniel was all "whooppeee!" and I was all wishing he'd pretend to be a little more under the weather than he was, and feeling guilted out at even considering going home before someone took a look at my chipper little guy, while feeling guily for needlessly bringing my chipper little guy to the ER in the first place. That last one had me feeling guilty for my treatment of him and the system. Argh. So we waited until midnight to see a doctor who then told me that we probably didn't need to come in at all anyway.
I should be grateful that the nurse was so conscientious, but four more hours of our lives spent in that place means I'm not quite there yet with the appreciation thing. As far as ERs go, this is probably one of the nicer ones, with a huge wide screen TV even, donated to the department by a local credit union, which would have been awesome had someone though to put on a dvd instead of the not-for-children crap that was on last night, bitch, moan, etc.
After seeing the teeny weenie doctor for long enough for him to tell us our visit was a waste of time, I took Daniel home and put him into bed and by 4.30am, he had another fever. I stripped him off and poured the requisite 1.5 mls of parecetamol down his protesting gullet, and off he went to sleep again. We didn't wake up until about 10am and he's been a bit feeble all morning. Not sick or anything, just clingy and sad. He's napping now, and it remains to be seen whether the fever will come back again. My money is on that it will.
Things I haven't got around to telling the internet which are kind of pertinent right now:
- Daniel has had at least ten colds since June
- He's currently on antibiotics for an ear infection
- He's shitting up a poop storm, so woot! Here's a shout out to the augmentin!
- He's been on ventolin this week, for his second bout of Bronchiolitis
- He's very iron deficient.
He has an appointment with a private pediatrician to work out what in fuck to do about his iron levels, but as that's not until January, so I've made another one with the pediatrician at the hospital, and we see him on Tuesday. Daniel doesn'tfit any of the risk factors for iron deficiency, the only explanation my doctor (who isn't actually my doctor, but as he's currently only working two days a week and is booked up until Daniel turns twenty seven, we're the Medical Centre sluts, and will take on whoever is available) has is that it might be because of all the damn infections he's had this year.
And that's all folks.
posted by aibee at 13:29
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home