Friday, April 30, 2010

The Dentist

Yesterday was a first. It was Allie’s first trip to the dentist. Dr. Mark Mays in Palm Beach Gardens is amazing. Giant butterflies and dragonflies decorate the walls. Free video games keep kids occupied in the waiting room. He’s really thought through making a good first impression. The second impression is where I got hung up. But there’s just no easy way to tell someone that their kid is going to have to be restrained to a papoose board (pictured left). The nurse brought us into the room and there it was being carefully guarded by giant, reassuring butterflies and dragonflies.

“I was wondering how you were going to do this,” I told Dr. Mays. He appeared in a Polo shirt with perfect hair and a pleasant smile. I instantly trusted him. But Allie had her reservations. His entrance was the Charming and Beautiful Susan’s cue to leave the scene as if her chair instantly burst into flames. She’s not so much help in a medical environment when her little one is the unwilling patient.

Dr. Mays was an artist even when working on a freaked out, special needs little kid. He gently, masterfully, and thoroughly cleaned and examined Allie’s teeth in under fifteen minutes tops.

When we got Allie three years ago, she was under nourished. And we weren’t able to brush her teeth for a year. We just couldn’t get her to open her mouth. The doctor let us know that this was normal and that he really expected her teeth to be much worse than they are. But she definitely needs to have some dental work done.

Typically, dental work is done in stages through multiple visits. But because of Allie’s condition, her work will have to be done in one sedated trip to the hospital. She has to have a follow up operation from last year’s hip surgery, so we may piggy-back the dental work on the surgery since she’s all ready sedated.

When I think about it, I wanna be sedated.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

My Baby Girl


Well it's been a tough couple of weeks for my baby girl. She has been sick so much lately.
We found out that Allie has some really bad ear infections which has been the reason for her being sick so often.
The antibiotics have not been working so they haven't been healing like we thought.
So this week she has had to go to the doctors to get a shot three days in a row. My poor baby.
She's such a trooper. She hasn't cried to complain which really surprised the doctor. He said most kids with ear infections this bad would be crying.
All I can say is that this kid is a strong kid. I'm so proud to be her mommy!

Friday, April 02, 2010

To de-crankify

Around our house, as Allie goes,


the whole house goes. If she's happy, everybody's happy. If she's unhappy, well, you know the rest.

Hey. I don't need a lecture about fatherhood and leadership. Are you trying to tell me things are different at your house? What? You don't have kids? That's what I thought.

Well, around the Mondok house when Allie's "in crisis", we drop everything and have some father/daughter time at the swing set.

That always does the trick.


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