Baseball & Pediatrician

Yesterday afternoon when Ben got home from work we took the boys outside to play baseball. Zak has mastered hitting the ball on their baseball stand that they got for their birthday last year so now he is working on hitting a ball that is thrown to him. He doesn't hit them a lot, but when he does make contact the ball usually goes flying! He is also really good at aiming and throwing the ball back to Ben. Ryder enjoys playing baseball as well, but he is still working on mastering the baseball stand. When we throw the ball to him he usually ducks and then uses the baseball bat as a golf club to hit the ball around on the ground. Ryder also gets very upset if something does not go as he has planned which tends to be very frequently so we have seen tons of tears from him recently.

The red welt on Zak's cheek is from Ben

accidentally hitting him with a pitch

The boys giving our neighbor a hug

Robin

I tried to get a video of Zak hitting the ball, but of course

once the camera was on he didn't hit anymore

(Ryder is crying in the background)

Ryder trying to hit the ball

When we told the boys it was time to go inside for dinner Zak went into one of his major meltdowns once again. They are becoming more and more frequent which is not fun at all. He refused listen and wouldn't come inside so Ben carried him inside and put him in his bedroom to give him time to calm down. Well, about 5 minutes later Zak was sound asleep! Usually when this happens he will only sleep for about 30-45 minutes, but last night he never woke up. I was worried he would wake up when he put Ryder in there at bedtime, but he remained asleep. He slept until almost 7am this morning so he was obviously tired.

This morning we had to be at the pediatrician's office for a 9:30am appointment. When I made the appointment I was told it would be with their actual pediatrician so I could talk to him about a few things as well as get the booster shot for Ryder. Well, when we got there I saw their pediatrician sitting in his office as we walked to the exam room next to it. The nurse asked what we were there for and I told her. She then said she had to go talk to the pediatrician and walked out of the room. She came back and asked if I had a letter or something from the Immunologist requesting the booster shot and I told her no. She went back to the pediatrician to talk and when she came back to our room she asked if I had their phone number. We went back and forth a few more times and finally I remembered I had the lab slip from the Immunologist for the blood work that needs to be done after the booster shot. So I want to the car and got it. On the top of the form it says "Blood work to be done at least 4 weeks after Prevnar booster shot received". Once the nurse showed that the pediatrician they agreed to give Ryder the shot. This made me mad because when I called to make the appointment I asked if I needed some sort of proof that the Immunologist wanted this shot done and I was told no! So we finally got the booster shot for Ryder taken care of. I then told the nurse I wanted to pediatrician to look at Ryder because he has had this runny/stuffy nose and cough for over a week. Her response was to listen to his lungs and then say he was fine.

As the nurse was trying to push us out of the exam room I told her I had a few questions and was told the appointment was scheduled with the pediatrician. She said he was on the phone and I could leave a message for him to call me back. That really sent me over the edge because I know he was just sitting in his office when we got there and I know the appointment was scheduled to actually be with him. I told her I needed them to check if Zak had been tested for the antibodies to the Prevnar vaccine because the Immunologist felt he should be tested if he had not already been. She pulled out his file and found the blood work that tested for antibodies, but the Prevnar was not one of them. So I told her I needed a lab slip to have Zak tested. The Immunologist has offered to test Zak on Friday, but I knew Zak had other antibodies tested so I wanted to check and see if that was one of them before I had him stuck with a needle. Well, the nurse went to the pediatrician once again to discuss this. When she came back she said the pediatrician wanted to wait to get the report from the Immunologist before testing Zak for anything. I tried to explain to her that Zak did not actually have an appointment with the Immunologist and so on, but she wouldn't budge or even go get the pediatrician for ME to talk to! I then asked if we could put Ryder on the scale because at his appointment on Friday he weighed almost 2 pounds less than what he normally weighs with clothing on. She agreed to do this and I am glad because he has lost about 5-6oz, but at least it is not the 1-2 pounds I was fearing.

So we left the pediatrician with knowledge that Ryder has lost weight, no lab slip for Zak to be tested, and never seeing the pediatrician to ask my other questions! I really really miss our pediatrician in Annapolis!! When we moved I almost chose to just make the hour drive to keep the pediatrician, but then decided I should look for somebody closer....