Doctor round 5

If I wrote this post yesterday, it would have been a completely different post.  I think I've calmed down a little and hopefully the tone of this will be a little less hysterical...

We went to the doctor yesterday...to those appointments I've been dreading since their suggestion.  It went as well as you can imagine. 

We get there at 9 and we find out that the dumb fucks radiology schedulers messed up and were supposed to back our two appointments right on top of each other.  So instead of an appointment at 9 and an appointment at 11, we were supposed to have one appointment with both physicians.  So what that meant was the speech pathologist wasn't available until 11...which meant we had to wait there....till 11.  This disaster is exacerbated by the fact that Joe has not eaten since 6 because he can't have anything to eat of drink for three hours before his appointment.  So we wait until 11, with nothing to eat.

Bless his little heart, Joe did wonderfully during that two hours.  He waved to every single patient that was there waiting with us, ripped every single tissue out of every tissue box and made me carry him (about 4 thousand times) down the hall so he could touch the braille on every door sign.  So proud of my boy during those hours.

Finally we meet with the speech pathologist who specializes in small children.  She was lovely.  Had a blue streak in her hair and immediately claimed Joey was her new boyfriend and that her husband wouldn't mind.  Loved her.  

She immediately took notice of Joe's breathing and asked when his last meal was (fucking forever ago!!!).  Then said it was weird that it had been so long since he ate and he was still this noisy.  Yes, lady, that is why we are here.

So then we go back for the fun stuff.  X-rays while drinking sitting up and laying down.  The one sitting up captured his upper throat the one lying down captured his upper GI tract through to his tum tum.  Sitting up = a breeze.  Laying down = pure torture. 

To get the correct picture he had to be laying on his side with his arms up and drinking this chalky substance all at the same time.  Four people holding him down and me shoving chalk down his throat led to a meltdown of epic proportion.  Me and the Joe in full meltdown.

When it was all said and done we came away with yet another "we don't know."  I wanted to punch someone.  

We did however learned some interesting facts about how Joe swallows.  Usually when liquid hits the back of your throat you stop breathing and swallow.  Joey, for some reason, lets fluid collect and enter halfway down his esophagus before he swallows.  This is weird, but not the cause of the squeak.  He also sometimes gets fluid in his windpipe.  Not too far though that it enters his lungs and possibly caused by the way he swallows.  We also learned that this swallowing weirdness could also have contributed to Joey not being a successful breastfeeder...who knows.

In the end we were referred back to Children's to visit the ear nose and throat specialist and have them take a look at his tonsils and adenoids.  These are the same assholes that said he had reflux (which we figured out through this latest episode, Joe does NOT have).  As expected, I'm not jumping for joy at the thought of going back to Children's.

As soon as I got to the car I lost it.  I called Rick and gave him the low down and basically broke down in to a pile of self loathing sobs.  Another doctor appointment with nothing.  Another episode of Joey being freaked out, strapped to something sobbing and holding his arms out to me for help.  To say I felt like the shittiest mom on earth, was an understatement.  After all this bullshit I can't help but wonder why we are putting ourselves, our son, through this.  So what happens when we do figure it out!?  They are going to tell us he'll just grow out of it, or there is nothing they can do....and so what, we go through all this to satisfy our curiosity, because we've already gone this far!?

Ugh.  I literally wanted to crawl in a hole and die.  Luckily Joe was very forgiving and let me hug him and cuddle with him for the rest of the afternoon.  Then, while laying on the floor with him I get a peak at his upper gums and notice 4 top teeth coming in at the same time.  My poor sweet bubbaroo was a perfect gentleman for 3 plus hours at the doctors office, all while working on 4 top teeth. 

I love him so much.  He is a much better person than me.

Rawr.