Living the Nightmare

You know those dreams where you're cooped up in a small windowless room with no hope of escape? Yesterday I took Lizzie to the allergist. Her appointment was at a time when I couldn't find anyone to take the other girls, so the four of us trooped in with a spring in our step and no idea what was ahead of us.

An hour and a half later, we were still in the room. Lizzie was getting poked 87 times in the back, but unlike Anna, many of her little jabs were irritated and itchy. When the nurse finished, she left without saying anything and all Lizzie wanted to do was itch her hives. I was holding her hands when Anna started yelling that she needed to go to the bathroom and "look at Daisy's pants!" I told her there was no way she needed to go to the bathroom again, she had just gone half an hour ago. I looked and Daisy had soaked through her diaper and one entire pant leg was wet. In an instant, I had completely become "one of those mothers" that I swore I'd never be. So I watched Anna go into the bathroom herself, praying that she'd be safe in there without me, begged a diaper off the office staff (later the doctor told me that the nurse wasn't feeling well; I thought she was just annoyed at me), and almost managed to keep hold of Lizzie's hands to keep her from scratching. I was so relieved when the nurse came back in and checked Lizzie's back, measured the hives, and put cream on. We were starting to get dressed when she said, "Now it's time for the arm tests."

At this point, we'd been there two hours and I realized that I'd forgotten snacks/bribes for everyone, and the collective blood sugar was getting dangerously low. We'd read every magazine, played with every toy, and gotten drinks of water. Anna had been to the bathroom three times, Daisy had escaped twice, and I was finished. But we still had to do the arm tests. So we steeled ourselves for more. My eyes must have gotten huge when the not-well nurse came in with 29 syringes. I really hate needles, in myself or my kids. Immediately I started telling Lizzie that she could do it, but inside I was also trying to reassure myself. Those were the nastiest needles EVER! Anna ran screaming from the room multiple times, poor Lizzie was screaming, the nurse was yelling at her (!) to hold still, I was trying to distract her and keep her from looking at the blood running down her arms, and Daisy was standing in the middle of the room, with no pants on, screaming. Then Lizzie's arms started to swell up and burn and itch, Daisy followed Anna out of the room, the nurse made a hasty exit, and I was totally at the end of my rope. I am so glad that I didn't scream at my children because I really wanted to scream. Another 20 minutes and we were still in that same windowless room. Lizzie is allergic to every tree in our backyard (we have many), weeds, grass, cats, and rats. Really, I would have been happy to have skipped the rat test and guaranteed that we will never, ever have a rat in our house, but I didn't know. So now we have a collection of medications for her eyes, nose, and lungs. We all went right to bed after dinner and are spending the day recoving at home.