Bad Mom Strikes Again
I believe we've established here before that I am a Bad Mom. This was confirmed again today.
You see, Bamm-Bamm got up this morning and seemed a bit sleepy. One of his eyes was a little bloodshot, but then, he got up at 4 fucking o'clock in the fucking morning. He went back to sleep after a little while, but still...I figured he was just feeling the effects of a lack of sleep. He was certainly in a good enough mood.
At 3:30 this afternoon, daycare leaves a message on my cell phone. They do not call or leave a message at my work number, so I don't even see that I HAVE a message until I get in my car and plug in the phone to charge. Bamm-Bamm, they tell me, has yellowy goop coming out of his eye and the part that's supposed to be white now looks like old, faded cotton candy.
Pinkeye. *shudder*
I call the pediatrician's office -- already closed for the day, of course -- and find out that the sick hours are late tomorrow, not until 9:30 in the morning. Doing the math in my head, 24 hours after treatment means that he still wouldn't be able to go to school or daycare on Friday. I wonder if I should go to an urgent care place, so I call the office's answering machine again and choose the option to leave a message for the doctor on call. It is then that I find out that this doctor's office charges you an un-reimburseable fee of $15 to talk to the doctor on call. I understand this is done to keep twitchy hypochondriac parents from bugging the living shit out of the doctor on call, but isn't this a little unethical? I hang up without leaving a message.
I call my insurance company's nurse line to see if they were any help. I talked to a lovely woman named Nicole, who agreed that it sounded like pinkeye, and said that if I wanted to take Bamm-Bamm to an urgent care place, I could, but I didn't *have* to...and was responsive enough to say, "Since he's autistic, he might prefer going to his own doctor rather than a stranger." I was impressed.
But the more think about it, the more I think that I don't want him to live through 18 more hours of goopy eyes than he has to (although the other factor to take into consideration is that I don't want to have to deal with 18 more hours of his goopy eyes than I have to, just in case for a moment there you thought I wasn't a Bad Mom). I decide to take him to an urgent care center, HMO be damned. I call the doctor -- the $15 call -- and leave a message asking for someone to call me so I could have permission to take Bamm-Bamm to a Doc-in-the-Box. Realizing that the doctor on call probably only checks messages hourly, I call the insurance company back to see if they could be of help, only this time, I call the customer service number, and get the HMO version of customer service. The ball of grump that answered the phone told me that my co-pay for such a visit would be $50 as long as I got my doctor's pre-authorization. $65 so far, I'm thinking, and that's before meds.
Then, the most amazing thing happens...the doctor calls right back. Not only that, but it's the same doctor we saw on Monday (who I love) for his six-year-checkup. She feels my pain, and calls in a prescription to the pharmacy for antibiotic eye drops immediately, and tells me to bring Bamm-Bamm in tomrrow to confirm the diagnosis. She even gave me tips on how to administer the eye drops.
She forgot to tell me to hold his hands away from his face (and, as I think we've also covered before, I'm not all that bright), and that the drops sting a little at first so he's going to want to dig his hands into his eyes immediately. The second attempt went much more smoothly.
So I'm home from work tomorrow. I'll try to keep him away from the Worcestershire.
You see, Bamm-Bamm got up this morning and seemed a bit sleepy. One of his eyes was a little bloodshot, but then, he got up at 4 fucking o'clock in the fucking morning. He went back to sleep after a little while, but still...I figured he was just feeling the effects of a lack of sleep. He was certainly in a good enough mood.
At 3:30 this afternoon, daycare leaves a message on my cell phone. They do not call or leave a message at my work number, so I don't even see that I HAVE a message until I get in my car and plug in the phone to charge. Bamm-Bamm, they tell me, has yellowy goop coming out of his eye and the part that's supposed to be white now looks like old, faded cotton candy.
Pinkeye. *shudder*
I call the pediatrician's office -- already closed for the day, of course -- and find out that the sick hours are late tomorrow, not until 9:30 in the morning. Doing the math in my head, 24 hours after treatment means that he still wouldn't be able to go to school or daycare on Friday. I wonder if I should go to an urgent care place, so I call the office's answering machine again and choose the option to leave a message for the doctor on call. It is then that I find out that this doctor's office charges you an un-reimburseable fee of $15 to talk to the doctor on call. I understand this is done to keep twitchy hypochondriac parents from bugging the living shit out of the doctor on call, but isn't this a little unethical? I hang up without leaving a message.
I call my insurance company's nurse line to see if they were any help. I talked to a lovely woman named Nicole, who agreed that it sounded like pinkeye, and said that if I wanted to take Bamm-Bamm to an urgent care place, I could, but I didn't *have* to...and was responsive enough to say, "Since he's autistic, he might prefer going to his own doctor rather than a stranger." I was impressed.
But the more think about it, the more I think that I don't want him to live through 18 more hours of goopy eyes than he has to (although the other factor to take into consideration is that I don't want to have to deal with 18 more hours of his goopy eyes than I have to, just in case for a moment there you thought I wasn't a Bad Mom). I decide to take him to an urgent care center, HMO be damned. I call the doctor -- the $15 call -- and leave a message asking for someone to call me so I could have permission to take Bamm-Bamm to a Doc-in-the-Box. Realizing that the doctor on call probably only checks messages hourly, I call the insurance company back to see if they could be of help, only this time, I call the customer service number, and get the HMO version of customer service. The ball of grump that answered the phone told me that my co-pay for such a visit would be $50 as long as I got my doctor's pre-authorization. $65 so far, I'm thinking, and that's before meds.
Then, the most amazing thing happens...the doctor calls right back. Not only that, but it's the same doctor we saw on Monday (who I love) for his six-year-checkup. She feels my pain, and calls in a prescription to the pharmacy for antibiotic eye drops immediately, and tells me to bring Bamm-Bamm in tomrrow to confirm the diagnosis. She even gave me tips on how to administer the eye drops.
She forgot to tell me to hold his hands away from his face (and, as I think we've also covered before, I'm not all that bright), and that the drops sting a little at first so he's going to want to dig his hands into his eyes immediately. The second attempt went much more smoothly.
So I'm home from work tomorrow. I'll try to keep him away from the Worcestershire.
posted by ilse at 6:52 PM
2 Comments:
Hmmm. I must have missed something. I did not find the part where you were a bad mom.
Hope that Bamm-Bamm feels better soon.
Ugh. Pinkeye sucks. I remember getting it as a kid and what a nightmare it was treating it - rather than drops, I had this thick ointment that made my vision all blurry. Good times.
Irrelevant fun fact - every time I read about the singer Pink, it always makes me think of pinkeye. I'm thinking maybe that's not a association she'd like people to make, but I can't help it.
Also, HMOs suck. But you knew that.
Post a Comment
<< Home