A Mommy Story

Thanks to the broken tooth, Cordy had to break her string of only visiting the doctor once a year in order to get a pre-surgery physical. I’ll admit that I was nervous, expecting a meltdown or at least a lot of non-compliance from my doctor-phobic daughter. She’s never liked going to the doctor, and has never let them do a full exam without a lot of screaming and being held down. We still don’t know her blood pressure, as a cuff has never made it around her arm yet.

But yesterday was a new milestone. She was mostly agreeable. When the nurse asked her to step on the scale, she did it without argument – a task she refused to do at the hospital over a week ago. I’d like to think that part of it was my different approach this time: instead of asking her to see how big she was (which she always replies “I’m four and a half big!”), I instead told her to step on the scale so we could make number appear. Ah-ha! Appeal to her love of numbers! Why didn’t I think of that before?

After the scale was out of the way, and my eyes came back into my head after seeing she weighs 50 lbs. (before you think it, she’s not fat. 50 lbs is reasonable for a 4 year old who is getting very close to 4 ft. tall), we then went into an exam room. The nurse wanted to get Cordy’s pulse, but Cordy did not like this woman touching her wrist and holding it for a long period of time. We tried asking Cordy to count to 15, count the fish painted on the wall, etc., but we never got past 8 seconds. The nurse gave up at that point.

When Cordy and I were alone in the room, she scanned the room quickly and found a magnetic drawing board. Suddenly she was happy as she drew pictures of grandma, complete with her trademark circled X, H, and an outline of her hand. We didn’t wait long before the doctor came in.

This was our first time seeing this doctor, so I didn’t know what to expect. But she was soft spoken, young, and seemed to understand Cordy well. She asked me several questions first, not directly confronting Cordy so that Cordy could get used to her in the room. Then she started off with simple questions for Cordy, asking what she was drawing, how old she was, does she have a sister, etc.

When it came time for the exam, I was prepared for the worst. However, Cordy willingly let the doctor put her stethoscope on her chest and back, even taking deep breaths when asked. She opened her mouth and said “Ah” on command, and didn’t complain too much when the doctor looked in her ears. She even laid down when asked so the doctor could feel her belly. I sat there the entire time, grinning like a fool in amazement, and at the end told the doctor that this was the first time Cordy has ever let someone examine her willingly. She was pleased to hear that.

The verdict: Cordy is fit for surgery. Other than low muscle tone (which we already knew about, and seems to be common in kids with autism spectrum disorders), Cordy has no medical issues.

I was so thrilled with Cordy’s performance, I agreed to get ice cream afterward. The two of us enjoyed our ice cream together, until about half-way through when Cordy bit down into an M&M and got that worried look on her face. “Does your tooth hurt?” I asked her.

“No, it’s OK!” she tried to reassure me, but the worried look remained.

“Your tooth hurts, doesn’t it? It’s OK, you can be honest.”

She shook her head yes for a moment, then shook it no. “No, my tooth is OK. It doesn’t hurt. But can you pick out the M&Ms from my ice cream, mommy?”

So her tooth still hurts. Next week is her surgery.