Appointments and Laughs

So, after my own personal nuclear meltdown yesterday, I'm having a better start to my day. To be fair, things did clear up a little bit yesterday, just like Jarvs said they would when I had an over-the-phone meltdown with her mid-afternoon. God bless her!

I got the appointments scheduled and cleared with TriCare (thank God! Not going to make the same mistake twice, you know) for both the neonatal specialist and the pediatric surgeon. And man, are they getting me in fast! The neonatal specialist is seeing me tomorrow (!) and the pediatric surgeon is seeing me on the first. It isn't a rush, they just had openings to get me in. I have to say, I feel like that's a first - a doctor's office actually having openings to get you in sometime before, you know, you die. LOL Chad's trying to be really good about the CCAM, but I still think it really freaks him out and he's just trying not to think about it. I mentioned the other day that they were sending me to meet with the pediatric surgeon and he had a mini flip out; he said how he was trying to look at things positively and that instead of focusing on the negative, I should have positive thoughts. At this point, I don't think (and I don't think the doctors do either) that the CCAM is just going to disappear. Even if it's not visible on x-ray, they don't just magically disappear. And it's usually still visible on a CT scan. It's important to remove it because they have a tendency to turn cancerous later in life. And let's face it, with my family history, this kid doesn't need any more help in being pre-disposed to cancer. But I just smiled and nodded because it seemed like that's what he needed from me at the time. He was home yesterday when I made the appointment with the pediatric surgeon - he asked me what the appointment was for, and when I told him it was with the pediatric surgeon for a consult, he calmly accepted it and filed the appt. info in his astonishingly rainman-like memory. So, my conclusion is that sometimes, he has a daddy meltdown just like I have my more frequent mommy meltdowns. Hey, we're only human!

Meanwhile, I wrote a very frustrated email to the perinatal care manager yesterday explaining how I feel like my needs aren't being met in the Maternal Fetal Medicine practice (read: the only appointments I've had are ultrasounds - my actual appointment was canceled, to be rescheduled (by them), but I wound up having to do that myself too). I also vented about how I resent the lack of concern on their behalf. She forwarded it to their office manager, who was not in yesterday. I'm expecting to be greeted by some answers and someone who is willing to expend a little time to listen to my cares and concerns when I go in for my ultrasounds tomorrow. And they sure as hell better see me before the (rescheduled) appointment on October 16th. I'll be 37 weeks by then, and by God, if they don't fix it to my satisfaction, Chad said he'd go in there and tear them a new one. Poor guy - I know it makes him feel helpless to come home and listen to all the BS I've dealt with thanks to the doctors and insurance. I guess it's turning out that I'd rather, at this point, deliver at Evans (if it weren't for the CCAM), because I felt like people there actually cared about ME and not just what was going on inside my womb.

Realistically, I've had issues with doctors and the medical profession for years now. I don't really trust doctors because I haven't met one who actually cared. There is a real lack of bedside manner, and don't give me that "they're overloaded" excuse. I had 120 students last year, and I knew what was going on in their lives, the things they worried about, etc. I saw all of them everyday - and I didn't get a chart to write notes down in and review real quick outside the door before I popped my head in. WTH are they doing caring for people if they don't really CARE about people?! Anyway, I'm not revisiting that rant right now - I've wasted enough time on it in the past. Just suffice it to say that until I meet someone who proves my personal assumption wrong, I'm going to continue on with my assumptions. So there. :P

Anyway, onto the second part of my posting title: the laughs. I recently joined parents.com (I've been on pregnancy.com for a while now), and I signed up for some of their daily email things. Why not? Knowledge is power. Anyway, in this email I got from them this morning, they mentioned some blogs on their site. Turns out, I'm late to the game, because the two I read have since been discontinued as of the end of August, but I was reading some of the back posts - holy crap did I laugh! The stories that these women posted were comically horrifying and strangely edifying a soon-to-be parent. It also is making me start to look forward to when our boy starts to manifest his personality, rather than just seeing him and holding him. I can't wait to hear what funny things our boy does and to see Chad teaching him all those little things about being a guy (like getting stubble, although if he's anything like his father and paternal grandfather, the poor kid is doomed to never being able to successfully grow a beard, mustache, fu manchu, etc.). It's nice, especially after yesterday, to find a chuckle and get back to looking forward to our son. Plus, it's nice to end a post on a high note.

Oh - PS - since we can't attend an actual birthing class, we've ordered a lamaze video to teach ourselves; it's not the same, but it's better than nothing.