My Girl

Aly is my child.

Really. I just discovered this.

MY child.

Now I didn’t get results from a maternity test or anything (I think that is called childbirth) but I still finally realized that she is MINE. It’s only taken me 11 ½ months to figure this out.

For the past almost-year I’ve crept around doctor’s offices and daycare wondering what I should do (should being the key word). She didn’t come with a handbook, so this was a little tricky (and a lot maddening). I drove myself crazy trying to figure out what I should do. I worried that if I didn’t bring in her in to the doctor early enough I was a terrible mother. I worried that if I brought her in too often I was a terrible mother. I secretly wondered whether there were flags on Pumpkin’s file at the Children’s Clinic alerting the staff that I suffered from Munchausen By Proxy and to put the folks at the Tin Tower with the white jackets on stand-by to take me away (ha, ha).

Finally, I got to my breaking point. I stood up to the pediatricians. Well, sort of. I actually went behind their backs and made Pumpkin an appointment with an out-of-town allergist for testing despite their baseless assurances that it was pointless. It was exhilarating and terrifying at the same time, like speeding or sky-diving. I was almost giddy with the danger – what would her doctor think if he only knew! He told me not to have her tested and here I was…having her tested.

So off we went on our clandestine adventure. Pumpkin was a champ with the back pricks (not so much with the blood-drawing, but who can blame her). Aaron and I peered over her little shoulder while the tests were “cooking” and watched one of the tests growing and reddening. I felt such self-satisfaction upon realizing that she did have an allergy. I was right. Those doctors at the Clinic didn’t know what they were talking about.

Aaron and I started plotting out the future of our dogs and our home – in our medical opinions it had to be dander and dust she was allergic too. How would we break the news to her canine brothers? T-bone for one would probably be relieved since he spends all of his waking hours with one eye on Pumpkin so he can dart away when she heads his way. This daily struggle straddles the line between comical and pitiful. Pumpkin wants nothing more than to play with T-bone. Baylor is old news – he will sit there for hours letting her pull his ears, his tail, his eyebrows. Where’s the fun in that? It’s the dog that plays hard to get that she wants. In T-bone’s defense, he does try to like her. When he sees her on all-fours with that determined look focused on joining him on his bed, you can almost see him grit his teeth to try and bear it. But then once her tiny hand starts reaching for his fur, he’s gone in a flash. Her “I almost got him” look is simultaneously hilarious and heart-breaking.

All of that said, we decide T-bone won’t really miss us anyway and will be happy wherever there are blankets and adults. Baylor is resilient and will bounce back as long as his new family plays ball with him occasionally. The house is a little trickier, but we have our whole drive home to figure that out.

Then the doctor walks in. “Good news – no allergies.” Wait, how can that be? What about the big red blob on her back? What about the sneezing and coughing? What about…my eyes well up with tears. The doctor explains the blob was the “control group” and since none of the others swelled…

I know that this is good news. But, really??? Could her pediatrician have been right? My haughtiness about going behind his back fades quickly. Heck, maybe I do need to get fitted for that jacket after all.

I compose myself and we look on the bright side. At least we know and at least we don’t have to worry about treating allergies. Then the bright side gets even brighter. My baby doesn’t have allergies. I did what I wanted and needed to do to ease my own worries, I got a second opinion, and, in the end I was right to take her off all the allergy medicine that she had been prescribed without even having been tested. I realized (perhaps for the first time) that this was our life, this was our child, and we were doing it our way.

One week post-results and she is snotty and coughing again but we could not be happier. This is my baby and I’m treating her my way – love and hugs around the clock. And I must admit, I think it is working based on the smiles I am getting in return. And besides, sleep is totally overrated. I know in a few years I'll only wish she was asleep on my chest on the couch at 3 in the morning!