I took Jane (now 10 months) to the doctor's last night, after hemming and hawing for a while. She had a fever on and off for 3 days, was terribly fussy at intervals, and was not sleeping great. When she woke up from her nap yesterday afternoon, she nursed as she normally does, but then as has been normal for the past few days, as soon as she pulled off (which was after the usual length of time) she started losing her marbles and bawling. What in the world? Teething? Why would she have nursed so well, and then fussed? So, that was the deciding factor in our visiting the doctor.
However, in my experience with doctors, and it is holding true for my kids as well, there is never any excitement. No one is ever hurt, there is no mysterious allergy causing a mysterious rash (if I had been posting a couple years ago I would have posted about Lucy's red spotty rash- it was just a a viral thing that eventually went away) and no one is ever sick. We never have ear infections or vomiting (well, okay, Lucy had the stomach flu once, but not a bad strain) and in the case in particular Janie showed absolutely no symptoms.
I know I should be grateful for a healthy family, and I really am, but sometimes I just want a diagnosis. Jane is fussy, therefore she is sick, and she needs this medicine. Boom ba da boom. Instead, Jane is not sick and it may be just teething, therefore take her home and give her Tylenol. Well, we did that and she is still a horrible wreck. But, that could just be because the tylenol wears off and I don't realize it... How is a parent to keep track of all this stuff? If I try, I get made fun of (by DH- lovingly, of course), and it's a heck of a lot of work to do. Who ingested what at what times, who pooped and peed at what hour of the day in which toilet, who is cranky because they missed a nap, who is cranky because they were woken up too early, who is cranky because they need my attention, etc etc etc. Now, I don't actually keep track of any of this on paper (at least most of the time) but if I don't at least try to do it in my head, then we are left not knowing exactly what is going on.
Anyway, Jane is sleeping now and for that I am truly grateful. Gotta go.
