Sometimes life comes full circle, even when you don’t want it to. Like when Eliot’s and my teeth started hurting at the same time. He’s getting in about 6 of them (because my babies can’t get them one at a time like normal babies. They have to wait until they are toothless for a good chunk of their baby-life and then get them all at once.) And I have three wisdom teeth and none of them had been a problem before. The aching gave me a lot of sympathy for Eliot. Or at least, it would have, if I hadn’t been in so much pain myself.
Anyway, an emergency trip to the dentist, a referral to an orthopedic surgeon, and Tuesday you would have found me in the corner chair of their office, hearing all the many complications that could happen when teeth are pulled and staring at the covered tray in front of me which I’m sure was hiding many different kinds of knives and pliers and poky things. The nurse also had a serious discussion with me about how for the next two days I needed to “not run, walk too much, or lift things” which made me laugh for a long time because I have two small boys and a husband that had an important work project due the next day.
The walls were glass and the office looked out over the whole valley, and it was a beautiful view, which seemed really to be mocking me because it was hard to see around the giant equipment that they were going to use to pry out my body parts. The doctor came in and talked to me about normal things like kids and living in Hawaii which was nice because he was being nice and annoyed me because I knew he was just waiting for me to fall asleep because he’d just sneakily given me something in the IV to make me fall asleep, and was in fact about to force my mouth open and use a pliers to pry out my beautiful teeth that my body worked so hard to grow.
On waking up without my teeth, I promptly fainted, which I think probably had more to do with the meds and finding myself so high up in the air and weightless without my teeth, and less at the surprise at the lost teeth, but you never know. I didn’t really remember much. Anyway, it prompted them to put me in a waiting chair for an hour, where they constantly sent a nurse in to check my blood pressure and check to see if the cabinet doors were still opening and closing. (Apparently I said I saw that? They could be making it up.) At any rate, they only opened and closed for 15 minutes tops, and then after that we had to deal with the fact that there were two of everything. Why a doctor’s office needs two of the same soap dispensers and two of the exact same concerned nurse with the exact same blood pressure machine is just beyond me. Consolidate, people. The economic times are hard.
Eventually they did listen to me in regards to my concern for their financials and the two soap dispensers became one and the two concerned faces became one concerned face and after making an important speech about smoothies and which one I wanted my friend to buy for me, we headed to elevator, where I almost fainted again, so we went back to the waiting room. People started heading home because it was after 5 and I still hung out, in their chair, in their room, monopolizing the nurse who I’m totally sure was ready to join her co-workers to discuss the funny antics of the day’s patients instead of listening to my stories about self-opening cabinets and smoothie choices again.
Eventually, the doctor came in again, said in an aside to my friend that he DID NOT want me walking through a pharmacy but I clearly needed more meds right away (what does he really know about me really) and that he thought I could make it to the car with enough help.
And I did, with a great deal of help, which is the biggest thing I accomplished that day.
Then, after making my friend get both my meds and my much discussed smoothie, (and without reimbursing her, as I now remember) we headed home, where I got to deal with my youngest who was dealing with his own teeth problems. I’m sure there are better ways of bonding with your babies then being extra grumpy together and requesting ice packs and medicine and making Daddy’s day a living nightmare. Someday I would like to try them. (Someday I bet Joe would like us to try them.)
But for now, still today and last night, Eliot wakes up crying at night, and I wake up trying to find more meds at night, and both of us drink smoothies and become overwhelmed at small things. And Eliot brings books so he can snuggle and read with anyone who is sitting down and I lie on my bed with my books and my kid’s cup so it doesn’t spill.
Life really is the greatest, you guys.
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