The Spotted Leopard Goes To The Doctor

This weekend I had a temporary post about some not so fun things that happened at work on Friday. Because of the sensitive nature of the post, I had to eventually take it down. But it still felt good to get everything off my chest. In short Friday was absolutely horrible. At one point, I was hiding in the office supply room silently sobbing my eyes out.

Friday was one of the most horrendous work days I have ever had as an attorney. It was second only to the day a random internet stalker copied all of my Facebook status updates and photos and pasted them in an email to all seven partners of my old law firm. The email also accused me of sleeping with cleints (FALSE!) and drinking during work hours (no comment). It's kind of hard to beat that.

Anyway, Monday I was excited to turn over a new leaf. I wanted to be productive and effecient and just obliterate my to-do list. Of course, that's the day my 4-year-old had to wake up completely covered in itchy white and red spots. I named him leopard. When he wasn't itching uncontrollably, he found the resemblance slightly amusing.

My first thought was obviously...chicken pox! But my mom assured me that kids don't usually get chicken pox anymore if they have been vaccinated. My first thought was one of disbelief. Seriously? Kids don't get chicken pox anymore? What is the world coming to? When I was growing up chicken pox was a central part of one's indoctrination into the real world. Sheesh. Kids these days!

I called to make the obligatory doctor's appointment. They couldn't get us in until 4pm. So I strapped the kids into the car, drove them to the store, unloaded them from their car seats, hauled them around the store in search of Benadryl. Then we piled back into the car and headed to my mom's house so I could attempt to get some work done. I was so focused on work that I nearly missed the doctor appointment. When I saw the time, I crazily shuffled the kids back into the car and we headed out to the clinic.

It wasn't until we landed into an exam that I caught my breath and assessed the situation. In my rush to get the kids out the door this morning, I let Jacob put on the clothing and the shoes of his choice. The result: he was wearing sweatpants nearly 2 inches too short, thick snow boots (it was not even raining), and Christmas socks. Mysterious speckles of leftover lunch covered his fleece sweatshirt. Was that speckle peanut butter? Was that one cream cheese? To top it all off, he still had remnants of St. Patrick's Day face paint all over his cheeks and forehead. AND my mom had decided to use a black marker to color a cat nose and whiskers onto his face. 

My kid looked like a ferile, green cat that had run through a basket of dirty laundry....who was also covered in itchy red welts.

I was suddenly very embarrassed. My kid was in worse condition than one of the octo-kids. But it wasn't until the doctor tugged at my son's clothing to check the extent of his spots that I realized the worst part. He wasn't wearing any underwear! Apparently he had a minor accident at my mom's and had no choice but to go commando.

The doctor did not look amused at all. I am very lucky that she let me leave that place with both of my kids in tow!

Just a sampling of the spots:

Oh, and the verdict? The spots are an after-effect of his ear infection last week. No, not an allergic reaction to his amoxocillin but actually from the ear infection itself. This is the same ear infection that caused me to spend 4 unpleasant hours in Urgent Care with two antsy-whiny kids on a sunny Saturday afternoon.