Gag Me

Most, if not all, of us have those gross little habits that we'd rather keep to ourselves...you nose pickers, zit poppers, booger eaters, belly button diggers, and toe-jam harvesters know who you are. There's some twisted sense of gratification that comes from the engagement of these habits. And some some of us don't care at all. My sixth grade math teacher used to sit at his desk and dig earwax out of his ear with his car keys, oblivious to the twenty horror-stricken, open-mouthed eleven year-olds staring at him. I can't tell you how many times I've passed someone in the car mining for nose-gold, as though their cars were an impenetrable refuge, impervious to the eyes of casual passers-by. Some people are blessed with an amazing lack of self-consciousness. Their blessing is our curse.

Kailey is bordering on developing a nasty habit that we need to nip in the bud, pronto. Her habit? Tonsil digging. No, I've never heard of it either until I witnessed it with my own eyes. Kailey's tonsils look healthy. They're not swollen or infected, but they are filled with this white, cakey, chunky, disgusting crap. And I don't know if it's just food that gets trapped there or whether her tonsils are secreting the junk, but regardless of the source, it's gross. Kailey's favorite pastime has become grabbing a handful of Q-tips and digging that crap out of her tonsils. I can't watch her do it. It activates my gag reflex and makes me want to puke. And I can't understand how she doesn't make herself hurl.

Now don't be mistaken. Kailey isn't merely scraping the stuff off the surface of her tonsils...SHE IS DIGGING IT OUT FROM UNDER AND BEHIND THEIR VARIOUS FOLDS. And when she digs out a particularly large chunk of crap, she brandishes it like an Olympic medal. "Look what I got, Daddy!" she gushes as she waves a Q-tip with a dime-sized chunk of tonsil-jam in my face. Then I run for the john.

We've got to put a stop to this. Healthy or not, those tonsils have to go. We need to get her into the doctor to see if there isn't something she can do about it. In the meantime, I would be perfectly happy, even proud, if Kailey moved on to a more normal disgusting habit, like nose-picking.

Another Fleet-ing Moment?

Hopefully...and hopefully not.

Kyra has been complaining of stomach pains the past couple of weeks. Combine that with the acid reflux that she regularly experiences and refers to as "heart pain", and it hasn't been a very fun time. We took her into the doctor Wednesday morning where we were informed that she could feel another "blockage" in Kyra's tummy. Yes, I said another. Not good news. Diane then took Kyra to get an X-ray of her stomach to see the extent of the back-up.

The first blockage happened a couple of years ago, and it was bad. So bad that Kyra was throwing up, getting dehydrated and not pooping at all. After several calls to the pediatrician, one of her nurses finally called us back with instructions. Diane was at work and I was the poor sap to receive her sadistic marching orders. "Yes, we're going to have you go ahead and give her a Fleet Home Enema and we'll see if that clears her out." Her delivery was monotone and matter of fact, as though she were telling me to do something as simple as showering, shaving, or clipping my toenails. I didn't even know what a Fleet Home Enema was.

"...a wha...what was that again?" I stammered.

"A Fleet. Home. Enema."

That's what I thought she said. "And can I get this at Walgreen's?"

"Yes."

And do you do house calls?

There are some things that you should never, ever have to do to your child. The Fleet Home Enema is one of those things. There are also life situations that reveal a depth of love that you never thought you could experience, a depth of love that empowers you to do things you never thought you could do, things like changing disgusting diapers, rinsing out puke-filled sheets, and giving Fleet Home Enemas. I took my bowel-bound 4 year-old to Walgreen's and picked up the treatment in the seemingly harmless green box. We returned home where I read the instructions, one thousand times.

When I felt sufficiently informed (notice I didn't say "comfortable"), I gathered Krya into the bathroom and gave her the lowdown. "OK Sweetie, this is going to help you go potty." I walked her through the procedure and told her that she was going to feel a lot of pressure and that she was going to want to poop. Really bad. "We're going to wait one minute before pooping," I said. "The longer it stays in, the more effective it will be and the more the poop will come out." Or so I thought.

At this point, if I were Kyra I'd be running for the hills. I thought that she would start to throw a tantrum, but she had no idea what I was saying to her, no frame of reference to let her know that the poop chute was a one-way exit only. She trusted me and simply replied with an "OK Daddy", and I felt terrible about the rude awakening she was about to experience.

I applied the enema and she freaked. It was the worst I have ever felt as a father because I was causing my child this discomfort. She screamed the whole time, but allowed me to empty the bottle and then sat on the toilet for that whole minute before letting loose. She was a complete trooper (a pooper-trooper, if you will) and though I felt horrible about inflicting this torture on my child, I felt equally proud of her.

The enema, however, didn't even scratch the surface of the behemoth that dwelt inside of her intestines. We had to do another enema, and when that didn't work, we had to delve into the realm of prescription stool softeners before Kyra was finally able to pass the obstruction. "Get the poop out" became our daily mantra where we encouraged Kyra to sit on the potty longer than her normal ten seconds. "Otherwise we'll have to go to the store to get another home en-e-ma." Talk about motivation to take a crap. Kyra would do well to take a page out her old man's manual of bowel movement etiquette: grab your book or the sports page and have a seat for some quality throne-time.

We have yet to hear back from the pediatrician on the results of the X-ray. She ran through possible treatment options where the #1 priority was getting Kyra cleaned out. She only mentioned using Merilax, an over-the-counter laxative, in that process, but in the back of my mind I have this strange feeling that we'll be getting a call from the nurse suggesting a parallel home-treatment.

I originally thought that the makers of the Fleet Home Enema merely had a good sense of humor branding their product "Fleet" which means "swift", or "to pass quickly" if you use the term "fleeting", because, really, that's what you need to do, pass quickly. But I did a little research and found out that C. B. Fleet was a man who built a bowel-cleansing empire! Talk about destiny. At any rate, all of us want this situation to pass quickly, with or without the home enema.

Junkie In Training

Kailey has had a lingering dry cough for about a month now. It originated from a cold, but decided to stick around for awhile after the cold went away. And it annoyed the crap out of all of us during our trip home to Illinois. Kailey couldn't go 30 seconds without coughing, usually just a single, steady, staccato hack. Try sitting next to her on a 4 hour plane ride or a two hour road trip:

Cough

Cough

Cough

Cough

"Sweetie, try breathing through your nose."

"OK"

Cough

Diane called the doctor on Tuesday and she told us to come in. Great, I thought, she's going to collect our co-pay, look at her for one minute, and tell us that it'll go away on its own. Imagine my surprise when she actually prescribed an inhaler for Kailey. Great, I thought, Kailey freaks out when we try to get her to take Children's Motrin. Getting her to suck on an inhaler three times a day should be tons of fun! Boy, when I'm wrong, I'm really wrong. Kailey couldn't wait to get her inhaler. She wanted to go to Walgreen's and get it right then and was completely bummed when I explained to her that I first needed to drop of the prescription and then give them time to fill it. "I'll pick it up and have it ready for you when you get home from school."

"OK," she groused.

The first thing she asked when emerging from the gate at school? "Did you get my inhaler?"

"Yes, I have your inhaler. It's at home."

"Yeay!"

She burst through the door and ripped open the Walgreen's bag to find a red inhaler, which she thought was pretty nifty. She coughed and asked, "Can I take it?"

"Please do," I replied, thinking this would be the only time she would voluntarily take the medicine. I guess when I'm wrong, I'm wrong in threes.

She placed the inhaler in her mouth, released the medicine, and took a deep breath. "Mmmmm...it tastes like...something. Kinda fruity. Can I take it again?" Thank goodness I was wrong, except now she wants to take it all the time. Every time she coughs, which is still with great frequency, she says, "I think I need to take another puff on my inhaler." That's all I need is for my eight year-old daughter to get hooked on prescribed inhalants, all because it tastes kinda fruity and comes in a hot red dispenser. I smell a lawsuit.

Cubs, Why Must You Torment Me?

I've been biting my tongue all season long, but I can't take it anymore. My Cubbies spent a butt-load of money in the off season and they still suck. Should I be surprised? Not really. Tonight, they blew a 4-0 lead against the Mets, eventually losing 5-4 by WALKING IN THE WINNING RUN! I've been an unwavering, die-hard Cub fan for nearly 35 years, and I'm tired of always waiting until next year. I know it's still early in the season to throw in the towel, and I hope to crap that I end up eating my words, but I'm tired of being cursed by loving a team that is itself cursed.

I blame my Dad. He made me a Cub fan through one small, simple gesture. And I vividly remember the exact moment in my young, impressionable life when I freely gave myself to the curse of being a Cub fan.

I was four years old and in the hospital for a series of skin graft surgeries to repair third degree burns on my left arm. Talk about a parent's nightmare. While at a babysitter's house, I thought it might be a good idea to stick that arm into her wringer washer machine, but soon learned otherwise. A wringer washer machine is an old-fashioned washer equipped with two rollers that "wring" the water out of clothes. It's the equivalent of the modern day spin cycle only nuclear turbofied. So while the machine was wringing the crap out of my arm, I stuck my right thumb in the gears trying to get some leverage to pull my arm out. Off came the tip of my thumb. Did I mention I was four? In runs my babysitter to find me stuck in and bleeding all over her washing machine. She popped the top off the rollers, freed me from her washing machine of death, and held me until my Mom arrived to take me to the emergency room.

They whisked me into one of the exam rooms and immediately began cutting off the long sleeve of my Garanimals shirt. I don't know if they still do this or not, but back in the early 70's, Garanimals were known for making long-sleeve shirts with non-elastic cuffs. That way boys couldn't pull their sleeves up to their armpits and stretch all the elastic out of the cuffs. Moms thought this was awesome. Boys frickin' hated it. Between my Garanimal shirts and Toughskin jeans, I was one miserable hombre. Anyway, because I couldn't roll up my sleeve, we had no idea of the extent of damage awaiting us under the shirt. Besides, everyone's attention was focused on my hemorrhaging thumb. How could anyone but a doctor have guessed there were third degree burns under my sleeve? They cut away my sleeve and the last thing I remember before passing out was, "Hey, why does my whole freakin' arm look like cheese pizza?"

I awoke the next day (or at least I assume it was the next day) to BOTH of my arms heavily bandaged and hanging in slings. I quickly became known around the children's ward as "Popeye" because of my bulging arms. Children can be so cruel. I had several skin graft surgeries over the next several months to repair the damage to my arm. Or maybe it was just weeks...I have yet to meet a four year-old with a good sense of time. Whatever the time frame, suffice it to say that I spent more time in a hospital than any four year-old should.

What does any of this have to do with the Cubs? During one of my stays in the hospital, my Dad, God bless him, brought me a gift, a talisman guaranteeing my lifelong devotion: it was a plastic Cubs batting helmet. It was my first piece of Cub memorabilia and I took it hook, line and sinker. From that moment on, the Cubs were MY team. All because of a stupid royal blue piece of plastic with a red "C" on the front.

He was a well-intentioned soul, my Dad. How on earth could he know he was passing down the curse? Somehow, now that I think about it, he knew. He knew exactly what he was doing. He himself had endured the torment throughout his lifetime, and now he wanted company in his misery. In time he recruited my brother as well, who is now paying the ultimate price. You see, my brother turned coat and became a bandwagon Cardinals fan after they won the Series in the early eighties. Now he's back and he's a Cub FANATIC, the worst kind of torture there is. His daily mood is determined solely by the Cubs final box score. Poor bastard. At least I see the final score, mutter "Stupid Cubs" and then carry on with my day. But it's getting old...really old. I don't want to wait until next year anymore.

A Parent's Nightmare

Diane and I took Kyra to a pediatric cardiologist this morning because she's been complaining on and off for the past few months of how her "heart hurts". We've come to understand this as anything from her heart racing and pounding in her chest to physical pain. At first, the "heart burn" was random and sporadic. Kyra, being the sensitive soul that she is, would experience it at school when one of her classmates got in trouble or if she got scared. But recently it's become much more common. She would complain that her "heart hurt" before going to bed or during/after physical activity. Diane finally took her to see her pediatrician hoping to get some answers to what we also hoped was nothing. She instead referred us to the cardiologist.

Last Friday, while Kyra and I were playing a rousing game of Roll Ball (because throwing a ball is not allowed in the house), she announced that her heart was burning. I crawled up to her from my Roll Ball position at the end of the hall and placed my ear to her chest. I could feel her heart pounding against the side of my head. I called a Roll Ball timeout, got up, and picked up the phone where I made an appointment with the cardiologist. The earliest they could see her was this morning.

I hate situations like this because at this point, everything's an unknown. And the mind doesn't like the unknown. The mind hates the unknown and can't leave it alone. Like a kid with a crusty scab, the mind picks, and picks, and picks at the unknown, filling in the gaps, usually with the worst scenario possible. In his book, Cell, which I recently finished (HA!), Steven King calls it a "panic rat". The panic rat likes to escape its cage and run rampant, knawing on the nerves of the unknown. The trick is to keep the panic rat caged, which I had been doing a pretty good job of. I kept telling myself not to worry until there was something definite to worry about, until this morning, that is, because last night, I had a dream.

I rarely remember my dreams anymore, so I consider it significant if I'm able to recall a dream when I'm awake. In my dream I was at a performance, a musical or a concert, and Kyra was playing a significant role. The performance wasn't taking place in a theater or a music hall, though. It was being held in what looked like a wide hotel hallway. The carpeting had a rose-colored floral design and I could see several doorways on the opposite side of the hall. I was aware of only one other person in the "audience" besides myself, and that person remained faceless to my left. On "stage" were two people I didn't recognize, a man and a woman, and Kyra. Another person, I can't remember if they were male or female, was just off stage in the shadows.

The man and woman were singing a song downstage (which was actually in the middle of the hallway) while Kyra stood upstage next to the wall. At regular intervals during the song, Kyra would walk downstage and sing a couple of lines to the song, then return to her position next to the wall. It was obvious, to me at least, that it became increasingly difficult for her to keep doing this, that something was bothering her, making it too emotional for her to go on. After about the third time she contributed to the song, she returned to her upstage position where the person in the shadows, whom I decided was the director, emerged to talk to her. The director whispered into Kyra's ear while rubbing her back or giving her a small hug. Kyra would then continue to walk downstage to sing her part, then return to the director. I don't remember what music she was singing, but it clearly was affecting her. Huge wet tears began rolling down her face as she sang, and I soon realized that I was crying too because I didn't know what was wrong with her and I couldn't go to her to comfort her in the same way as the director.

That's all I remember of my dream. What's weird is that I didn't remember it immediately upon waking. I was getting ready for the appointment, shaving actually, when the memory of my dream hit me like a ton of bricks. That's when the panic rat escaped for a little while and I struggled to maintain my composure. I just kept telling myself that we didn't know anything and that it was useless to worry and panic. Thank goodness it was only an hour before the appointment.

We arrived at the doctor's office and filled out the eight million forms and questionaires. Kyra was scared, because to her, doctor's office = SHOT. Diane held her and assured her that there would be no shots; that the doctor would just listen to her heart. At one point during the visit, Kyra, being a very sharp six year-old, asked Diane a question. "Mommy?" she asked. "Did you ever have heart problems when you were a kid?"

"No, Sweetie. I didn't."

"Then how do you know I won't get a shot?"

Diane shot me a look, and I shot her a grin that said, "You're screwed! Have fun answering that one!"

The nurse came in and took Kyra's blood pressure at both her arm and leg, and also conducted an EKG. Kyra was incredibly brave during the EKG, and actually enjoyed having the stickers deposited all over her chest and stomach. "This is just like Grammy," she told the nurse, who completed her duties and then exited the exam room. The cardiologist arrived about twenty minutes later (why do they always take so frickin' long?) and began his examination.

The good news is that the EKG was normal and that Kyra's heart sounds great. The bad news, if it can be classified as such, is that he's not sure of what's causing her heart pain. His gut feeling is that it's acid reflux; that her "heart burn" is heartburn. And he suggested that some kids are just a little more nervous than others, which would explain the racing heart. Still, he suggested that we keep a log of Kyra's "heart burn" that includes time of day, what she was doing, and whether pain preceded or followed the racing heart. If it gets worse, we head back to see him with log in hand.

So on the one hand we're relieved: initial tests proved to be normal. But there's still the question of what's happening inside her little heart. There are still not enough definitives and too many unknowns. I hope that it's just heartburn, that she's just a nervous kid (which raises other issues), but we don't know for sure. There's still the possibility that there's something else going on in there, and the panic rat is always poised and ready to run amuck in the back of my mind.

One of Those Days

I'm tired. Today has been one of those days that I can't wait to get behind me. It all started at around 5:00 am this morning when we were awakened by the sound of Kyra crying and coughing up a lung. Kailey has been sick since last Friday and has missed three days of school, and yesterday afternoon Kyra started coming down with whatever has been ailing Kailey. Diane got up (God bless 'er), tended to Kyra and discovered she had a temperature of 103. Great. Thankfully and unfortunately, Diane had already scheduled a doctor's appointment for this morning: thankful because we'd at least get to the bottom of what's been sidelining the girls for the better part of a week; unfortunate because Kyra knew she was going to see the doctor and she was scared. She proceeded to whine and cry for the next two hours until I got up at 7:00.

I dragged my carcass out of bed and proceeded to get the girls ready for their doctor's appointment while Diane showered and got herself ready. Kyra, being the drama-mama that she is, continued to carry on about her doctor visit. I offered to pick out an "extra special secret video" for her to watch to keep her mind off the doctor. I told her to close her eyes while I dug through the video cabinet. Basically the girls only watch the DVD's that are on top or close to the front, so I thought if I dug one out from the back, one that they hadn't watched in eons, it would be like she was watching a new video. It worked. I popped "Ice Age" into the DVD player...end of crying. I'm a frickin' genious.

The girls left for the doctor's appointment, but I had marching orders of my own: bills to pay and a house to clean. My mom is flying down from Las Vegas for the weekend and the house is a disaster zone. I had it pretty well picked up a couple days ago, but anyone with young children knows that it only takes a couple of minutes for them to completely destroy what it took you hours to clean. Do over. Start again.

I made a pot of coffee, jumped on the computer, checked my e-mail, and went to pay the rest of our bills for the month. This usually takes me about five minutes, but today it took close to an hour. The site that I use to pay bills kept logging me off and then I had to track down two bills because for some reason they didn't post to the site. Turns out they weren't due until the end of the month and I could have waited another couple of days to pay them, but I didn't know that at the time. It's going to be one of those days.

The rest of the morning was spent folding laundry; piles and piles of laundry. I didn't know we owned that many clothes and I certainly don't remember washing all of it. In the meantime, the girls came home. The prognosis: a viral infection. Kyra won't be able to go back to school until Monday, and, barring any setbacks, Kailey can return tomorrow. She should have gone back today because she was bored and bouncing off the walls. She wanted attention, but we had a house to clean. Sorry kiddo. Pick up a mop and earn your keep.

I finished folding the mountain of laundry just in time to get ready for work. Diane decided to make a quick trip to the store while I was still home. So she left and I took a very quick shower so that Kailey couldn't torment Kyra for that long. I didn't hear any screams of bloody murder, so I guess things went OK. I went through my grooming routine, and Diane returned as I was getting dressed. She walked into the bedroom and paused for a moment to behold my glorious physique before announcing, "The back tire on the van is really low." Fantastic.

I offered Diane a deal, "If you'll pack my lunch, I'll fill the tire before I leave." Done. I went into the garage and grabbed the air compressor, set it for 32 lbs, attached it to the tire, and cut her loose. The tire slowly began to fill and after several minutes the compressor reached its target and shut down. But I still heard noise coming from the tire: PFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF! Crap! I sauntered back into the house. "Umm, you don't have to go anywhere this afternoon, do you, Hon?"

"No. Why?"

I opened the garage door so she could hear the rapid deflation of the tire. "Holy crap!" My sentiments exactly. I didn't have time to change the tire before work, so guess what I'll be doing bright and early tomorrow morning? Yippee.

I arrived at work where everyone was all atwitter because a new seafood restaurant was providing free lunch as a promotion. I love seafood, but this stuff did me wrong...REALLY wrong. I'll spare the gory details, but suffice it to say that intestinal distress at work is never good. I think the Bluetooth guy even walked in during one of my "episodes" and made a hasty retreat. Add to that the stress of dealing with a of testy, overbearing client and I was ready for the day to end.

And to think I get to start off tomorrow by changing a tire. I just hope it doesn't mean tomorrow's going to be one of those days too.