The Zen of Poo*

As if the title weren’t warning enough. Don’t read if you have a weak stomach.

A couple of weeks ago I twittered this little tidbit.

Just collected the Girl’s stool samples and put them in my fridge. You’d think once they’re potty trained… but you’re never done with poo.

My friend pointed out how zen like that little sentence is. You really are never done with poo.

Tonight it was a phone call at 9pm from the Girl’s pediatrician. The good news is that she doesn’t need to get blood drawn tomorrow, because they already have a diagnosis. We now know the reason she sometimes wakes up in the middle of the night screaming and clutching her stomach.

It was dramatic when it happened, but so intermittent that we figured it was just gas pain. She is our resident drama queen after all. Except that even drama queens don’t usually start yelling before they are really even all the way awake.

But my mother in law had two dreams in a row about the Girl having worms several months ago. Then my little sister in law had one that was very similar. So we had it as a thought flitting around when she started pointing to her lower intestine when we asked where the pain was. It seemed to fit, and I finally made an appointment with the pediatrician our HMO assigned us, whom we had avoided up to now.

I called her office the week I was miscarrying Shiloh and said, “Look, my kids aren’t vaccinated. It’s not because I’m stupid or lazy. I’ve spent a lot of time and done a lot of reading and I’m comfortable with my carefully considered decision. I think my daughter has parasites. I do not have the energy this week to get into a conversation about shots or have the doctor yelling at me. So is this going to be a problem or can I bring her in?”

Poor receptionist didn’t know but promised to ask and call me if the doctor had a problem with it so we could switch care providers. It turned out that she was a very gracious middle eastern woman with a voice that sounds almost exactly like this actress. She ordered a full spectrum of tests.

And that’s how I found myself catching and scooping poo into vials for the past few weeks.

We were right. It’s apparently fairly rare here in the US. She starts a course of treatment tomorrow for a type of flatworm. In the words of Forrest Gump, “It happens.”

*How many philosopy geeks are there who will get that one?