A day at the doctor during pregnancy...

           You have to love seeing the doctor. You get your appointment set weeks in advance then you mark it on your calendar and don't think about it until the day before. It's usually earlier in the morning because when you MADE the appointment, you were thinking of all the things you could be having to do in the afternoon that day. Of course when your alarm goes off earlier than you'd like, you lay there wondering WHY you made it so early instead of the afternoon.. It's a no win self battle. There is no GREAT time to go. Period. The extra joy added to MY doctor visit today was taking my entourage with me. Nothing like hanging out in a waiting room for twenty minutes with super patient children... Now if your appointment is at 9am and you GET THERE at 9am.. You're not on time, you're LATE. You're only on time if you arrive there fifteen to twenty minutes early. So if I live five minutes away and my appointment is at 9am and I have to plan to leave around 8:35-8:40 right? WRONG. Normally, yes. But not with kids. With kids it's more like PLAN to leave at 8:20 and actually leave around 8:30. That gives you time to deal with pesky traffic and the lack of close parking spots with two kids saying, we have to walk all the way up THERE? (I was feeling the EXACT same way because the day before I had made my kids a giant board game that took up our entire driveway with sidewalk chalk.. After all of the take a step, bend down, squat down, stand ups I was doing.. Today my legs were KILLING ME! I seriously felt like I was walking like a wounded duck or something all the way up the parking lot! And yes.. it was far enough!!!) I was on time but it was close. So we go in a giant revolving door and the girls LOVE it.. So far so good.. Go to the office, sign in, then sit down in the three of seven available seats scattered around people in the waiting room. I don't even bother busting my phone out because I can already hear what would happen... "I want to play a game" "I want to watch a video" "I just want to HOLD it.." and so on. So it stayed zipped up in my purse and we waited. Five minutes... Ten... About seventeen minutes later my name is called. YAY! I get up and we go. First I'm asked to step on a scale... I close my eyes and tell the nurse to just write down the number on her chart. (She does) I step down and am escorted to a bathroom where I'm asked to do the whole cup thing. What sucked was that I had to go to the bathroom SO BAD before we left home so I went.. The girls and I stood in the bathroom for a few minutes with my oldest saying "Mom, just GO!" "I CAN'T go!" I try to tell her. I stand there and REALLY concentrate on going to the bathroom.. Nothing. I close my eyes and think of water, lots and lots of water... Nothing! Finally my youngest says SHE has to go. I opened the little window to grab a cup and it was opened by a nurse on the other side! Luckily it was high enough to where we only saw each others faces.... After that I just tried and was able to get out MAYBE twenty drops... Horrible. Note to self.. Never pee BEFORE the doctor no matter how bad I have to go! I put the cup in the window, washed my hands and met the nurse back out in the hallway. We followed her to a small little cubby like room down the hall where I was asked about my medical history and had my blood pressure checked. "Do you have any history of psychosis?" Hmm... I looked at daughter number one smiling at me in the corner.. then over to daughter number two in the chair smiling at me.. "I guess not.." She smiled. "Okay, wait right here while I get the room ready and I'll come back for you". So again, we're waiting. A few minutes later she comes back and we follow her to another room where she tells me to remove my top for an exam. "Just place this over your chest and the doctor will be in soon." She leaves and I place my kids in a corner chair. I tell them to look away so I can take my shirt off and of course I get eyes trying to peek at me through fingers as they giggle. I grab the "sheet" which was more like a pillow case and put it over my chest. Doc comes in, does the exam, we hear the baby's heart beat, the doctor leaves so I can get dressed and I then have to explain a little what she was doing. I don't know if that's ever NOT awkward but their reaction was simple.. "That's weird." Ok! Sit with the doctor in her office while she tells me everything's fine and gives me a paper that I need to give people at the lab SOMEWHERE else in the hospital to get my blood work done. GREAT! So we go outside, get in the car and drive around to the opposite side of the giant building. Park, walk and come to another revolving door. My youngest goes in first by herself and so we go in the next little space. The thing is automatic as long as you're moving forward. If you turn around and face the panel behind you, it stops. So here she is turning around to look at us...STOP. I tell her to turn around and walk, she does, then stops making the door stop AGAIN. I tell her again and she pops out the other side, then us. We go to stand in a line to turn in my little paper. I finally get up to the desk and I'm asked to sit in one of the seats across from her. Okay waiting room again.. After about ten minutes I'm directed to a little window. Answer some questions and sign a few things then she asks me for my wrist. She gets ready to give me my bright neon orange wrist band and all I could say was "Alright! Accessories!" She started giggling to herself as she told me to go across the hall where I would find another.. wait for it.. WAITING ROOM! So we go and sit again. There is one tiny TV mounted on the wall with some trying to be funny talk show playing, a guy riding on a machine that I'm assuming was the equivalent to an industrial sized vacuum and about 25 random people and couples all their for their own reasons. That part is fine but what I can't STAND in waiting room (Aside from being forced to wait..) is how many people just STARE at you. I get there's not a whole lot to look at there but SERIOUSLY? Are you here to get a creep booster shot or what? LOOK SOMEWHERE ELSE. I mean even I scan the room to see what kind of people I'm around (mostly to make sure I don't sit down next to someone constantly sneezing or wiping their nose on their sleeve..) But once I sit, I don't just LOCK ON to someone until I'm ready to go. It's very creepy, totally unnecessary and did I say creepy? YES! I mean to kill time while NOT on my phone, I might check out some peoples clothes with a passing sweeping glance or their shoes. I look at the multi colored carpet and mismatched furniture if there is any.. Stuff like that. My kids at this point were still enough but starting to get restless so I had to peak their interest a bit.. "Why are we in this part of the hospital?" "Well.. They have to take my blood." "All of it?!?" "No.. Not ALL of it.. Maybe one or two tubes of it. See, they will take a needle, stick it right here and my blood will go into a tube." My youngest... "Will it squirt all over the place? Because that's gross and you would need like a hundred band aids!" (Ahh the seriousness in the face of a five year old...priceless..) "No, it's not going to squirt anywhere. It's not going to take long and we'll be able to go right after that ok? Can you hold on just a little bit longer?" "Do we get to see the blood?" I say.."Yes, you'll be right there with me." She replies.."Yes, we can hold on." Hmm... That might sound a little crazed unless you knew ME then you would just be reassured she is mine.. :) After two of the creeps get called in to their rooms I finally get called to mine. First thing she says.. " I'm going to need a urine sample." Again???? I had to literally SUMMON it last time not even an HOUR AGO! I tell her I might have to wait so she agreed to do the blood part first. I sit in the chair as my kids stand anxiously close to the opposite side of the nurse watching her every move... She puts the band on my arm and wipes the sweet spot with her antiseptic wipe.. Then out comes the needle. My youngest gasps and her eyes get wide.. In it goes... "Mom does that hurt? Are you bleeding?" The first tube goes in and fills rather quickly. My oldest.. "GROSS!!! That's a lot of blood!!!" (Just the right person to have in that situation right?) Tube two.. three.. four.. and finally tube five gets filled and she takes the needle out. Morbidly curious to see the possibly gaping hole in my arm, they both lean in and realize it's nothing but a tiny little spot. "I can't believe you did that! Please don't make me do that..." I just laugh a little. "No.. not today anyway" And I smile at them as they watch my bandage being put on. The nurse hands me a cup and I actually had no problem going that time. THANKFULLY! Finally it was time to be done! We escaped through the giant door for the last time and made it to the car... Next appointment set up for next month and hopefully it will not be as "eventful" as this one was... (At least the kids will be in school by then!) It's been a long one and I'm glad to be OUT!!!  ^_^ -Super Mom