Yesterday we had The Visit… Kaelin’s 18-Month checkup at the doctor.
Actually, I should just start using the phrase “Nurse’s Visit” because I can’t remember the last time my child was actually seen by her doctor. Unlike some people, whose pediatricians have obviously spent enough time with their kids to recognize BOTH parents (!!!) in a non-office-type setting in which the child is absent, our pediatrician wouldn’t know my child from Winnie the Pooh, with the possible exception that my daughter is slightly less fuzzy.
So as other moms have so accurately detailed, there’s something strange that happens when an ordinary mom takes her ordinary child into the ordinary pediatrician’s nurse’s office. I don’t know the name for this phenomenon, but I think it falls somewhere between pensive insecurity and psycho-ree!-ree!-ree!
The first thing you have to do when you go in is answer a bunch of questions about your child’s development. The questions are yes/no answers and those are the only choices. Once you hit 3 “no’s” then you have to stop, signaling the end of your child’s developmental progress.
But it’s not like an internet quiz where you get results at the end. Nobody ever tells you WHAT the questions are FOR, or what they mean, or at what point it’s normal and OK that you have to stop.
Which makes it all the more nerve-wracking. All you know is that “yes” is good, and “no” is bad.
And here’s the kicker… if you don’t know the answer, or the child has not had the opportunity to try the skill mentioned – you have to answer “no.”
This is a problem for me because I’m not good at tests. Especially when I didn’t study. Because really they’re not testing HER. They’re testing ME.
YOU HAVEN’T HANDED YOUR KID 5 BLOCKS TO STACK? FAIL! YOU FAIL!
Now, most of the questions we breezed through pretty easily.
Can your child pick up a ball and throw it overhand?
One of her favorite hobbies is to remove the dog’s chew toy from his mouth, run away giggling while he tries to get it back, and then throw it at him. So I felt pretty confident in answering Yes to this one.
Without being guided by you, can your child scribble with a pencil or crayon?
Um…have you seen my bathtub?
Can your child recognize and point to objects in a book when they are named?
And tell you what it’s called and what noise it makes and what color it is and whether there are one! or two! butterflies.
Does your child know her body parts, like facial features?
Yes. She can name and point to hers, and mine, and her stuffed animals’ and Dora’s. …Ok, she can’t decide whether a shin is her knee or her foot, and she tells me her mouth is hot when her throat hurts…but she totally knows everything else.
Can your child string two or more words together to communicate?
If you planted a tape recorder in our house, you would hear a never-ending stream of “poopy butt!” and “owie arm, kiss!” and “open O’s please Mama” and “outside please!” and “go away puppy!” and “thank you thank you thank you” and “up stairs, open (the gate) please”? Yeah.
But then they got harder…
“Can your child dress/undress herself, other than socks, shoes, hats, accessories?”
Um…is she supposed to be doing that? I can’t remember if she’s ever tried, but I know if she had I would have discouraged the behavior. The last thing I need is my kid doing a strip tease in the middle of Target.
“Can your child hold and drink from a cup without a lid or spout, without spilling?”
Um…what? Do you know how much carpet we have in our house??? Why on earth would I voluntarily hand a 1-year-old a cup that doesn’t have a sippy top on it?
I’ll tell you why. Because this stupid question stumped me at the nurse’s office and was “no” #3. The end, you’re dead, thanks for playing. So naturally I had to go home and try it.
I handed her a glass of water in the form of a sippy cup without the handles and lid. And by golly – she did it! I mean, eventually she got some up her nose and down her shirt, but that was after I let her carry it around the house.
Which is all fine and good, but the nurse’s office didn’t know that she could do it …I had answered “NO” on the questionnaire. They think my child is inept at the holding and the drinking.
“Should I call the office and tell them to change the answer to that question? To say YES, she can hold and drink from a cup?”
“Are you serious? You’re still worried about that?”
“But she can do it. And I said she couldn’t.”
“So?”
The nurse had told me that most kids her age couldn’t do the holding and the drinking thing. The nurse had also told me that most 18-month olds threw tantrums during their checkups.
So why was I so horrified that Kaelin had thrown a tantrum about half-way through the visit?
Because it wasn’t like her. The nurse was getting the wrong impression of my daughter. She had woken up 2 hours early that morning and had not had a nap, in addition to just getting over a fever and sore throat. Under normal circumstances she would have been happy through the entire visit. At least until the rounds of immunizations.
Dear Nurse,
My daughter can hold and drink from a cup. Without a lid. Just so you know. And today she took her pants off all by herself. And normally she’s a very happy child but she was sick and tired at the visit.
I just thought you should know about that in case you were thinking about recommending that we hold her back from the first grade 3 years from now based on those questions. I also think you need to add an option after each question that says “If NO, please explain…” …or at least have “n/a” as one of the answer choices. You really should consider that.
Sincerely,
Does my kid get a gold star?
Dear Kaelin,
I’m sorry your mother is such a spazz.
Love,
Mama
PS: One day I fully expect you to start telling people we’re not actually related and that you found me in the park somewhere and decided to bring me home and now I just follow you around wagging my tail and begging for treats. Unfortunately, nobody will believe you because you inherited all my facial expressions.
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