Knock on Wood

So far, so good, on the hamthrax watch. Knock on wood, of course. Charlotte is having some side effect/cold action going on. Massively runny nose, lack of appetite, mood swings. But no cough or fever which are the big signs of H1N1. Or fever and vomiting, which marked her bout with the flu last time.

Which doesn't mean we have it easy here in the Casa De Sick. Charlotte is a little wild, not napping and not eating. She told me this morning that she is "vewwy hungwee", but she won't actually eat anything except juice and veggie sushi. Yesterday she completely rejected two whole meals...she ate a hot dog bun and a slice of cheese when she was out with my sister, mom, aunt, grandmother, (and of course, baby G), but at home all she ate was juice and veggie sushi.

Yesterday was really fun, though, otherwise. My mom is having a hard time living in a different state than her two grandchildren, and often comes out for a one-day visit (3+ hour drive each way!!) to see us. Since she works in the higher ed system, she had Veteran's Day off, so she coordinated a visit with my sister, her sister, and her mom. They made their almost-annual pilgrimage to the Yankee Candle flagship store, not three miles from my apartment. Nana (Charlotte's name for my mom) couldn't bear the thought of being so close and not seeing us, so she asked if she could stop by (briefly, because I was working). Matt jokingly suggested that she take Charlotte with her, since Charlotte loves Yankee Candle. Mom was thrilled, and agreed to pick her up.

Charlotte really does love Yankee Candle - part of it is the actual candles, she really likes smelling them - the flagship store is this Christmas-year-round kind of place that sells candles, ornaments, seasonal decorations. It has several theme rooms, including a woodsy-Christmas tree forest that has fake snow come down every 6 minutes, and a toy train track suspended from the ceiling in several sections of the store. Charlotte loves to go and smell candles, see trees, see snow, and see the train. Eating a snack in the cafe and occasionally getting a toy are just bonuses that she hasn't caught on to yet.

Mom and Nicole took Charlotte over with the rest of the visiting family, and were gone for almost 3 hours...3 hours which I didn't have to do anything but just work. Since I can't just work, no matter what, I also ripped several CDs to my iTunes, ate a snack, and finished casting on for a new sweater...but I did also get tons of work done. It was very bizarre to be done with work at 9:15 last night, instead of working up until midnight and still having some left over. I'm not sure what to do with this information now that I have it; there is still no extra $ to get Charlotte into a day care program so that I could have time to work during the day, but it is good to know that I can be so productive when I have time to myself. I kind of thought that I had lost the knack.

Matt wants to banish Charlotte's nap, since she sleeps so well at night when she doesn't sleep during the day....but I really need this time to regroup and prepare for the afternoon steady decline into madness. I think our schedule needs to be tweaked somehow, but I'm not yet sure how to do it. And I need to remember that a week when Charlotte isn't feeling well isn't the time to implement any major changes, anyway.

Alright, off to work while Charlotte is having some quiet time.

Hamthrax Vax: A Saga in Four Parts

Preface:
This is long and probably boring, but I need to get it out of my system. For some reason, this has just dominated my brain, and I need to spit it all out.

I: Part the First, Wherein We Question the Necessity and/or Safety of the H1N1 Vaccine

So when I first heard about the H1N1 vaccine I thought that probably Charlotte didn't need it. She doesn't go to day care, she's a healthy child, etc, etc. But after doing some thinking and reading some articles, Matt and I decided that we did want to do it. Matt is a very hard-scientist thought process kind of guy, and a strong believer in herd immunity. And I started thinking about my baby nephew, and my sister the elementary school teacher, and how we spend a lot of time at the library and how we just got a membership to the Holyoke Children's Museum, and how those 19 otherwise healthy kids died from H1N1, and so Matt and I did decide to get the H1N1 vax for Char. Easier said than fucking done, thank you very much.

There was further debate on whether to get the inactivated virus injection, or the live virus nasal mist. Originally I leaned towards the mist, mostly for ease and because I was a little concerned about the heavy metal content of the inactive injection. I know that there was mercury in the majority of those, but I couldn't find any info how much. Researching this whole issue is a nightmare. No agency in charge wants to actually say, "Yeah, you know what, mercury is a poison but we use it in the injection." You get a lot of articles that say, "Mercury was proven not to cause autism, just get the shot!" Which missed the point of my concerns entirely. Matt and I agreed, after both our research, to get Charlotte the nasal mist version of the vaccine as soon as it was available. Which it wasn't and wasn't and wasn't. Our pediatrician's office has a pretty comprehensive website with a section I thought of as "Vax Watch '09." As soon as the vaccine was available, they'd post times for the clinic.

II: Fist-fights and The Lottery: The First Attempt

Finally, the first full week of November, the H1N1 vaccine (hereafter referred to as Hamthrax Vax, or just "the vax") became available at Charlotte's peds practice. There were to be H1N1 clinics from noon to 1 every day, with evening clinics from 5:30 to 7:00 Tuesday to Saturday. Charlotte and I showed up at 5:40 on Tuesday night. There was a police office in the parking lot, directing traffic. I later found out that there had been a "scuffle" at the noon clinic that day, so the police officer could have been there as a squelching presence, as well. After waiting in line for maybe 15 minutes, a woman came out to say that there were numbers being distributed and that the wait at the end of the line was going to be at least 90 minutes, considering that they averaged a minute a vaccine. I was totally prepared to wait, except for the fact that a) I didn't have a snack for Charlotte and dinner was coming and b) I had forgotten to put the stroller in the car, so Charlotte would have to stand with me in a dark parking lot for two hours. After a teleconference with Matt, we decided that we would try our luck the next day, coming armed with stroller, snacks, and activities.

III: Friday Night Lights: Preparation is for Naught, and We Are Turned Away Again

After I posted my vax fail on Facebook, a number of people suggested that we try calling and scheduling an appointment to get the vax for Charlotte. I was pretty sure our practice wasn't doing that, that they were just doing the clinics, but we decided it was worth a try, and Matt called the office. They told him that they were only doing the hamthrax vax via clinic, and that they were dividing their remaining supply into three days, and that the first third of the alphabet could come on Wednesday, the second third on Thursday, and the last third on Friday. Our last name starting with V, we planned on the Friday clinic.

At this point, our preference had changed from the live vax via the mist to the inactive vax injection. Charlotte had gotten a live vax for the seasonal flu, and she had gotten a mild case of the flu from it. Fever, vomiting, lethargy, the whole nine yards. Also, I heard a radio story on NPR discussing the vaccination, and that the amount of mercury in the injection is about the same amount you would get from one serving of tuna. Considering that I have not eaten tuna since the last time it was forced on me (probably, oh, 25 years or so) and Charlotte has never had it, I am pretty sure that she has no mercury built up in her body, and the amount from this one injection is totally an acceptable risk, in the opinions of myself and her father. Especially considering our concerns that since she got sick from the last live vax, she might get this illness too.

Charlotte and I were in line. I had her hat & mittens, and she was in her stroller playing with her Hello Kitty. A nurse/office manager/whatever came out with a sign that the clinic was closed and an announcement: "All healthy children from 2 to 5 years of age, we're asking you to come to a clinic on Sunday from noon til four. Unless you already have a number, or are asthmatic or under 2, you will most likely not get a vaccine today." I started to get really, really pissed at this point.

"Excuse me," I said. "I was told specifically to come today so that my two year old daughter to get a vaccine."

"Yes, well," she said. "We're asking that otherwise health children over two come back on Sunday."

"Is that for the live virus mist?" I asked. "Because I really want her to get the inactive vaccine. The injection."

(Pay attention, because this is important.)

"Oh yes," she said. "I understand. We only give the live virus to children over three."

"Just to be sure," I said. "She'll still be able to get the injection on Sunday?" This is the most forceful I get with medical authority. Even office staff. I am just uncomfortable arguing with medical people.

"Right," she sighed. "If she's two, she can get the injection." She then raised her voice again and repeated her announcement to the parking lot. "If you are here for a healthy child between the ages of 2 and 5, please come back on Sunday. Only under two and asthmatics tonight." Charlotte and I left, with a little tears on both our parts. Charlotte had visions of fishtanks and chalkboard tables dancing in her head (ah, the waiting room) and I was exhausted from trying to deal with this scheduling nightmare.


IV: Lying Liars and the Lies they Tell; Plus, a Mean Nurse

Sunday rolls around, and Matt and I are both taking Charlotte to the pediatrician's office, with stroller, snack, toys, and two parents. This way one person can stay in line and one person can chase toddler. We arrived at the office at 11:20, before the clinic started, but not quite first in line. Charlotte was kid #9, family #8. I chatted with other parents while Matt helped Char on a little climbing/play structure in the courtyard. A woman two people behind me was back for her third time, too. The woman behind me said that her husband brought her son Friday night, but had to leave.

As the line inched forward, we got to go in the office and check in. The two people in front of me I both got info sheets on the flu mist. I saw a folder labled "Flu Mist Facts." I got a sinking feeling in my stomach that the only available option was going to be the live flu mist vax. When I got to the receptionist, I asked her if there was any injection. She said no, today was the mist only. I told her that on Friday I had been told that she would be able to get the injection today. She gave me a blank look, and just said, "No."

"Uh. You see, the last time she got a live vaccine, she got sick from it."

"Hmm. That's very rare," said the receptionist.

"Right, that's why I'm concerned. And that's why I asked on Friday and was told that I could still get her the injection today."

"Well, we don't have any and we're not doing it today. We are supposed to get 400 more doses sometime this week. And if you watch the website, we'll post information about another clinic."

I called over Matt and did a quick conference, thoroughly aware of the hundred people at my back every second I took. We decided to just go for it, since this has already been three days of rigmarole. We took our number, 8, and then went in to the waiting room so that Charlotte could watch the fish, color on the table, and torture other small children by totally crowding their personal space. I chatted with another Mom whose family had been on the same schedule as us - their last name starts with S, so he had also shown up on Friday and was told to come back on Saturday. He found out that what happened was that they had so few people show on Wednesday and Thursday that they opened Friday for everyone. Her husband had been ready to dump the practice after that, and so was Matt when he heard that story. I have had two years of great experiences there, but I was pretty damn disappointed.

Our number was called, and we were ushered into exam room #13 with a woman who was a nurse? PA? med tech? I have no idea, but let's call her a nurse just for the sake of this story. Let's call her Nurse Ratched. That's an exaggeration, but she was really unpleasant. She took our information, asked if we had any questions. I repeated the fact that we were concerned about Charlotte contracting a mild case of the H1N1, and asked again what we should be looking for. She sighed and said, "Fever, vomiting, lethargy. Okay?" Matt and I exchanged looks, but then we got down to business.

Matt put Charlotte on his lap, and held down her arms. Once Nurse Ratched started coming towards Charlotte and reaching for her nose, Charlotte started squirming. One hand got free. "I need you to hold her! There are a lot of people out there, and I need this to go as quickly as possible!" Nurse Ratched barked.

We kind of just stared. I'm still feeling my heart thump. I have never been spoken to like that by a medical person before - EVER. Charlotte started crying. "It's not going to hurt!" Nurse Ratched crabbed, advancing.

I stepped up. "Look," I said calmly. "She was just here two weeks ago to have something pulled out of her nose with really big tweezers. She's very sensitive about her nose right now, and she's clearly scared." To Nurse Ratched's credit, her face softened, and she did take a step back.

"Oh, well," she huffed. "It's not gonna hurt, okay?" she said softly. Matt pinned Charlotte down more, and I helped hold her head. Poor Charlotte sobbed afterwards, just totally sad about the whole thing. After that, Nurse Ratched made a hasty retreat.

Matt and I walked out of the room, and I looked at his face. "I know you're pissed," I said. "We'll write a letter, let's just go, okay?"

Epilogue: What to do, what to do?

So. Mission accomplished, but with only a qualified success. Yes, Charlotte did get the Hamthrax Vax, but not the way we wanted, and with a really disappointing experience at the office. Matt is ready to break up with them, but I'm not. I really wanted to come back to Nurse Ratched and say, "Hey, I know you want to get through this quickly, but this is my fucking third time here within a week to get this damn shot, and you may be pissed at how long we're taking, but I'm pissed at how fucked up this is. And you didn't make these decicions, so I didn't bring it up, but if you're gonna bitch at me, I'm gonna bitch at you." But I didn't. And it seethed in both Matt and me all day. I think my original instinct is the best - I am going to write to the office. I'm debating about whether or not to include the nurse incident and the nurse's name, or just address the whole "Come back another day. No, come back another day. Yes, we'll still have the injection availabe. No, only the mist." Matt was pissed because he didn't remember the nurse's name, but I do. I'm just so bummed. It's like when I found out my stepsister's otherwise awesome husband doesn't believe in gay marriage, and in fact doesn't really like gay people.

Okay, maybe not as bad as that. But close.


Preface:
(pictures are from this morning, before all the drama!)

Late-Night Craft Projects

I'm currently embroiled in a new crib-cover project for Charlotte's foot board. If you recall, that is the piece of bed that she chews to bits. We had a padded cover for it (also the topic of a post), but Charlotte has picked the cover open and is pulling out bits of polyester batting and sucking on the fluff.

Urgh.

At this point, I almost have to wonder if she has some weird form of pica, but I know that's not the case. Charlotte just investigates things with her mouth, like a horse, or puppy or...her mama. I did the same things when I was a kid. HOWEVER. I did not stick fluff up my nose, requiring a trip to the doctor's office. Dr. Chabot was very nice and efficient, and very carefully explained to Charlotte that noses are for smelling with and breathing with. NOTHING is to be stuck up there. I was just so happy that Charlotte's practice has weekend hours for urgent care, so that we called ahead and got an appointment within an hour, and paid a regular co-pay, rather than sitting in the emergency room for hours with the pig flu and huge co-copays and all that.

Charlotte was not suitably concerned by all this. That was on Saturday; by Tuesday she was telling me that she had fluff in her nose and that she needed to go to "dockta office." The fact that they have a fishtank, chalkboard and stickers apparently wins out over any trauma that pulling a small, bloody & mucusy piece of grossness out with mile-long tweezers may have caused. So now I am making a cover for the footboard of the bed that is just fabric. It never needed to be padded, it's not like Charlotte is a head-banger, just that's the only one we could find. There is a minor issue; two, really. One, I can't sew a straight seam and two, my sewing machine is in my sister's basement, along with any fabric I might have. I got creative - bought some fat quarters at Michael's and some iron-on fabric tape. We'll see how this works out.

In happier news, Charlotte is really enjoying the books she got for her birthday. She got three Mo Willems books, Don't Let The Pigeon Drive The Bus, Knuffle Bunny, and Are You Ready To Play Outside? Her "auntie" got her several books, including Blueberry Girl and Crazy Hair, both poems by Neil Gaiman that were illustrated into childrens' books. Auntie Jen thought that Charlotte might be "too young for Neil," but wanted her to have them anyway. Charlotte surprised us all, and loves the two poem books. I guess she's about the age that really enjoys rhyming and predicting the future. It's some sort of developmental stage, I know that, I just can't remember if it's called anything in particular.

We read a zillion books a day in this house - new books, old books, library books, board books, everything. Matt reads 2 to 5 stories at bed time, I read a few before naptime, and a bunch more in between. So it's not surprising that she has books memorized, and that she repeats our tones and inflections. The stuff that sticks with her, though, can be pretty strange.

Charlotte will bring out a book and then read it out loud. The other day it was The Giving Tree. She opened it and said, "The Giving Tree, by Neil Gaiman." I laughed out loud at that. That is seriously funny, because I started imagining a version of The Giving Tree written by Neil Gaiman. You can bet that the tree eats the boy at the end, I'm just saying. Or at least tells him off in a rhyme.

Other favorites have been, "Goodnight, Moon, by Mo Willems," "The Mitten, by Neil Gaiman" and today's giggling moment, "The Bread Book, by Neil Gaiman." The Bread Book is Artisan Bread in Five Minutes A Day which Charlotte loves for the pictures. Or, maybe not. "Ooh, recipes," she said.

Is this how Jane Fonda started? Because I'm okay with it, if that's the case.

Today's instance of hilarity ensuing had to do with my yoga mat. For some bizarre reason, possibly Sesame Street induced, Charlotte calls it an "octagon." Anyway, the last two days Charlotte has been very intrigued by the yoga mat, and asking me to unroll it so she can use it. Yesterday we did some Winnie the Pooh up-and-down excersizes, and she kept bending over and "go sideways." Today she turned into a tiny Aerobisize instructor:

"Up and down, Mama, up and down!"
"Do jumping! Jump, Mama!"

I showed her a few more things, some arm and neck stretches, hip twists, and up-to-the-sky stretches. This so delighted her that I actually had to roll up the yoga mat and put it away so that we could stop "stretchin'" and move on with our lives. My sister Nicole and my nephew G came over for a visit, and I told her about it. Nicole thought it sounded so funny that she wanted a demonstration. "Good luck with that," I said. Auntie Nicole spent the next five minutes at the whims of the tiny dictator.

"Onnie Nicole, uppa sky! Down, uppa sky!"
"Stretchin' you arms, Onnie, stretchin' you arms!"

Nicole then showed Charlotte a couple modified yoga moves (one is that you hold lay on your stomach and hold yourself up on your arms so that you look like a seal) that she used to do with her third-grade class, and Charlotte ate them up. Charlotte also started doing "fallin' down," which means lay on your back and breathe deeply. This is the point at which I realize that Charlotte must have seen a yoga class on TV somewhere and has taken it upon herself to teach us that we must all have quiet meditation at the end of our workout.

This is seriously one of the randomest funniest things that Charlotte has started doing in a list of random funny things - but there's this kind of creepy undercurrent of how just seeing something a couple times on TV has made this deep impression on her. I'm really struggling with making sure that she watches less TV vs. getting more work done vs. Charlotte begging to watch "mo dye-saur twain." It's probably the singlemost guilty conscience thing I have going on.

Well, that and all the goldfish crackers.

Being the parent of a toddler is like being recruited to be in some piece of performance art. Charlotte has a very specific vision that is completely beyond me. This thought occurred to me today as I held a small decorative gourd in each hand, and Charlotte had a pumpkin bucket on each arm. "Now, hold it! Hold it!" she screamed, even though I was already holding the gourds. I tried to explain trick-or-treat to her again, but she just kept telling me to "Hold it!"

Then she ran off to cook something in her kitchen while singing the "I'm a T. Rex" song.

Terrible claws!

Well, I could have started this post with a burst of motherly guilt about not having handmade Charlotte's Halloween costume, and how it's not even that creative or ordered from a small Etsy shop, but that's all moot now. Because Charlotte LOVES her Old Navy 2T-3T tiger costumer. I mean, LOVES it. She said, "I have a costume! I like wear-a costume!"



I tried it on her today in order to buy us some post-nap, pre-grocery store trip time. And to make sure that I wouldn't have to exchange it, etc. I put it on her and told her it was a tiger. "It a costume," she corrected. Charlotte was impressed at the claws on her hands. "Terrible claws," she told me.

"Terrible claws?" I asked. "Terrible claws like Where the Wild Things Are? Or terrible claws like deinonychus*?"

"Like a dinosaur," Charlotte insisted. "I tyrannosaurus. T. Rex!" Then she roared and stomped around the living room and my heart grew three sizes too big. It's hard to be a Grinch about a cranky toddler, messy house, and more work to do when your kid is having such a great time. I'm not gonna post pictures yet, I'll save them for actual Halloween, but I did take some and show them to Charlotte. "That Charlotte in a costume! Tiger!"

* The other day on Dinosaur Train they talked about deinonychus, and how it means "terrible claw". And then yesterday I was reading her some dinosaur book and I pointed it out again, "That's deinonychus. Remember from Dinosaur Train? It means "terrible claw"." Charlotte said, "Gnashed it terrible teeth," which is a line from Where the Wild Things Are, and follows the line, "showed their terrible claws."

House of Germs!

Phew, the last three weeks have been crazy, and the last 10 days Charlotte has been sick. Not serious, but not fun for anyone either. A couple days after her birthday, Charlotte had her 2 year-old immunizations and the FluMist flu "shot." She had a fever, malaise, and one incident of vomiting. Poor kid. After she threw up and while Matt was cleaning her room and I was cleaning her, Charlotte said, "I spitting. I spitting, Mama."

"It's okay," I said. "You weren't spitting" - spitting is Not Allowed - "you threw up. It's okay, you were sick and you threw up."

"I spitting," she repeated. Clearly, she didn't really get what was going on. Luckily, we have a friend with a carpet cleaner, so it wasn't the worst thing in the world, but it was fairly traumatic all around.

Charlotte recovered from that in time to catch a totally DIFFERENT cold that I had, that involved a sore throat, stuffy head, and losing my voice. Now Charlotte is bossing me around in a nasal voice, and coughing when she should be napping. How is it that we have TWO erectile dysfunction pills clogging up my TV air waves, but no one has yet developed a safe and effective toddler decongestant? Priorities, people.

Lots of crazy developmental stuff right now. Charlotte's current obsessions include the new PBS show Dinosaur Train. There is nothing sly or jokey about this show - it is quite literally about a train for dinosaurs. It is like toddler crack. You know how Elmo is crack for one year olds? This is like that - but even more unexpected. After a couple episodes, Charlotte says to me, "That a brachiosaurus," and "Triceratops eat plants!" She found this little train that was attached to a play table, and the only train she has, and she brought it to me saying, "That Dinosaur Train. Dinosaur Train!" Charlotte got some dinosaurs for her birthday, and she was showing them to her baby doll, Judah (named by Charlotte!!). "That stegosaurus. Here triceratops. Triceratops eat plants. Plants inna garden!"

Negotiation has kicked in...she's been doing this for a while. "How 'bout Play-Doh, Mumma? How 'bout more book, Daddy?"

I'd love to post more, and I'm working to get back in the habit, but I gotta get some work done before midnight.