This is Harder Than I Thought

It's been difficult to avoid the negative comments lately. Particularly with Molly ending up back in the hospital; and a new hospital at that. What's going to be even more difficult - and I should have thought of this sooner - is keeping to my previous years' sacrifices. Remember, I mentioned the altered driving behavior and the disappearing F word? Well those things seem to be related to one another, and with all the driving I have been doing lately it seems that I have more to think about than I ever imagined. But I can do it.

Also, at the end of my previous post it seems I may have suggested we're not happy with the medical care at RWJ. This could not be farther from the truth. They are a tremendous bunch of doctors and nurses and their facility is top-notch. We've just gotten used to the way things happen at CHoP and we began to take for granted the fact that virtually everyone who we came in contact with knew everything there was to know about Molly and her needs. Now we go to another facility and they need to know everything from square one.

It gets very frustrating when you have to answer very basic questions. It's obviously for the patients own good and the medical staff's preparation, but it will never get less annoying when someone asks, "does she have any medical conditions we should know about?". We also tend to forget that we spend every minute specifically dealing with Molly and her needs. These people see hundreds of patients every day. I suppose they're entitled to a few questions.

We did get a compliment from the pediatric ER doc the other night. After going through the Q&A with us and gathering as much intel as possible he shook his head a little and asked "are you health care related? I mean are you physicians or something?" We're not foolish enough to suggest we could be, but it was nice to hear. Erin and I got a laugh out of it later. I said, "You would have to be a nurse and me a doctor. You know all the gritty details, know how to do all the hard stuff, you keep track of her meds and all that. I just come in, ask a bunch of questions, and then leave."

At any rate, what I should have said at the end of that post was that it resembled going to a new tax guy. With a new tax guy you have to start from scratch: How many children? Household income? Charitable contributions? It's always more time-consuming and a little bit frustrating as compared to going to the guy who has been doing your taxes since you were single and renting an apartment for $750/month. And, more than likely, just because the new guy has a shorter waiting list it wouldn't justify making the switch.