Thoughts from the middle of the night

Sarah (not her real name) was one of the first patients I started seeing when I joined the practice I am in 9 years ago. She was a baby who suffered from innumerable ear infections. She sticks in my memory because of the ferocity with which she hated me and my instrument of torture, the otoscope.  At first, she would scream when I looked in her ears. Then by about 12 months she’d scream when I walked in the room. I would try the trick of leaving the door open and sort of casually standing in the doorway like “Oh, I’m just passing by and chatting with your Mom, pay no attention to me.” Some kids fall for that. Not Sarah. Not ever. By the time she was 2 her Mom told me she would scream as she made the turn from their house onto the road to come to our office.

When Sarah was about 4 or 5 she came in for a visit and needed a ear check. I got out the otoscope. No screaming. I approached her. No screaming. I looked in her ears. No screaming. I stared at her in surprise. I had seen her the week before and she had been her usual self, this was like a switch turned off rather than a gradual warming up. I said “Sarah! You didn’t cry!” She just looked at me, gave me a little mischievous smile and shrugged her shoulders as if to say ” I’m over that. That was so last week.”

I saw Sarah last night for a well check up. She is now a lovely girl of 8 yrs old. She’s beautiful, talkative, smiles and laughs with me. And never complains about any of the exam. Not even the otoscope. Whenever I see her I’m reminded that watching kids grow up is one of the privileges and joys of being a pediatrician.

Seeing kids like Sarah over time helps give me perspective on how sometimes kids just need time. And sometimes our job as a teacher or parent or doctor is just to let them have the time they need to grow up. It’s a lot harder to do this with my own kids than it is to counsel someone else to have patience with a certain behaviour or issue with which they are dealing.

My own kids have never been “good” sleepers. We don’t subscribe to the crying it out philosophy and I think some of the things we do combined with their personalities have contributed to this. But I’m learning to ride it out. I should say here that other than nursing when they are babies, H. gets up with them about 95% of the time when they wake up at night. So it’s easy for me to say I “ride it out”. I’m doing that mostly in my own bed. Occasionally though the boys want Mommy and only Mommy.

Last night was one of those nights for David. He woke up screaming, I suspect from a bad dream. H. went in there first but he kept crying that he wanted his Mommy. So I went in. (On a side note, I couldn’t tell if he was telling me he “had a bad dream” or “want some ice cream”.  I suspect that the bad dream was about someone not giving him ice cream. Which is truly a nightmare. But I digress.)

I lay down next to him and his chubby arms circled my neck. His forehead pressed against mine and he was immediately soothed. I thought how nice it is to be able to solve all his problems just by being there. I know the time that will be true is fleeting. The day will come soon enough that he will have problems I can’t solve or he won’t turn to me to solve them. When the memory of him waking up crying in the middle of the night is only a memory. When the last thing he’ll want in the middle of the night is his Mommy. And that’s how it should be. But for right now, I’m glad that I can give him the time he needs to grow up at his own pace.