Meanwhile – Back at the Orthopedic Doctors Office…

Haven’t we all noticed that the older we get, the faster time flies by.  And I have come to discover that the passage of time exponentially increases with the addition of kids!  It is almost impossible to believe that we are in the final throes of summer vacation.  School children everywhere are feeling the carefree summer lifestyle slip away with every trip to the store.  No more pink lemonade – now it’s all pencils and paper new shoes and underwear.

Of course, we have a year or two (or three or four) before Mike reaches that stage.  And the date circled in red on his calendar might not have been marking the first day of school – but it was certainly marking an important date.  Another trip to the Orthopedic Doctor for a foot checkup.

As is always the case, the approaching appointment brought with it the nervous unease of impending bad news.  We certainly had no reason to suspect bad news – Mikes feet have been doing outstandingly good.  At least in our opinion.  But who are we but mere parents – and new ones at that!  There may be a doctor in the house – but a PhD does not mean MD.  And we certainly haven’t spent our entire adult lives treating clubbed feet.

And there’s always those nagging early memories.  Those first several trips to see the Orthopedic Doctor.  Before the tenotomy.  Back when Dr. Visit = new cast = more pain for Mike.  Or Dr. Visit = new brace = more pain for Mike.  Those equations are very hard to break.

Realistically, we haven’t had a trip like that for over five months.  And five months is a REALLY long time considering Mike is only 8 months old!  So we don’t have anything to worry about.  Right?

We walked in to the doctors office last Wednesday and it was like we were with a rock star.  Nurses were jumping over the counter in a mad dash towards us.  The first nurse reached us (after a NFL caliber move over and around her co-workers) and said, “Here.  Let me hold Mike for you.”  The other nurses, grumbling in there defeat, finished rolling out the red carpet and dropping rose petals ahead of us as we walked back to the examination room.  A quick x-ray of Mike’s feet (a couple of nurses in the background.  Let me do it!  No – let ME do it!).  Then it was time for the doctor.  He came in – the lights sparkling off of his smiling teeth.  “So – lets see what we’ve got here.”  He took hold of one of Mike’s feet.  A twist this way, a bend that way.  Rotate around.  Pinch in various places.  Mumblings about the pronate of the metatarsel.  Then it was the other foot.  More twisting, bending, rotating, this way, that way, and the other way.  Pinching, pinching, pinching, mumble, mumble, um hum, um hum.

It was about at this point that I realized that my fear of the prognosis that this doctor was preparing to give us had caused me to not draw a breath for the last 23 minutes.  I casually exhale the stale air from my lungs with an “I meant to do that” flair.  The doctor twisting the first foot a little more.  Rotated the second one a little more.  Another pinch.  He turned around to look at us and he said…

Mike’s…

feet…

look…

GREAT!  No changes – and the brace can continue to stay off during the day.

WOO HOO!  The disco ball dropped from the ceiling, Gloria Gaynor (I didn’t know she was a nurse here…) started singing “I Will Survive”, confetti was blowing all around the room and we all danced until the early hours of the morning.

Completely exhausted, we packed up the diaper bag.  Four nurses instantly appeared at our side to help us carry Mike out to the car.  On the way out, I swear that I heard them humming “We Are Family”.  Sister Sledge?  Surely the Sledge sisters aren’t nurses at the same place with Gloria Gaynor.  It was dark after all – but the nurse on the left certainly looked like Joni and the one on the right could have been Kathy…

As we buckled Mike in his car seat, the doctor called out, “see you again in three months”!