Week of health care crap

That's what I'm calling this week. My family never really gets sick, we don't really see doctors that much. But it seems that suddenly, everyone is seeing SOMEONE for SOMETHING...this week.

Yesterday JP took Emma to the eye doctor to get an exam and new glasses. I had to work, otherwise I would have taken her, but I am trying to delegate, so JP handled it. He did a good job, too, I saw the receipt, I know. But in talking with Emma afterwards, I heard that she picked out some purple frames. Ugh. Oh well, she's a kid, and if she wants to wear purple, who am I to stop her?

Today when I'm done with classes at noon, I am rounding up all the children and JP is taking the afternoon off, and we are all going to the dentist. We make these appointments 6 months in advance, and they just put us in their appointment book as "the Nikky family" and all 5 of us just take over the office for about 3 hours. We all really like our dentist, the kids think he's funny and nice (and he prefers to be called "Dr. Erik" and the kids think that's great) I really like him because he looks like Tim Robbins a la Shawshank Redemption... so cute. Plus, he's the one who I first talked to about getting my braces. When I was talking to him (every time I talk to him) he wears his little mask thing, and I said something about "I'm thinking about getting braces while JP is in Iraq..." He pulled his mask down and smiled real big: metal mouth! He said "It's never too late!" He's got his off now, and he looks great.

Then tomorrow I am taking Alex in for a general physical and to have his chest X-rayed. His breast bone is protruding and looks goofy. It happened about a year ago, and when it happened, it actually got a huge bruise right in the middle of his chest. We went in to the ER and they said it was nothing, they did the films then, too, and said they didn't see anything out of the ordinary. REALLY? Don't you think the fact that his breast bone sticks out THAT FAR is a little out of the ordinary?? Of course, this was "Dr."Blair Nelson, the horrible asshole doctor from the ER that I think I have mentioned before and vented about before. I hate him. He is a quack.

I filled out my expense report at work last night (finally!) for my trip to Grand Forks, so soon I will have a deposit of just over $400 in my account. Plus my first pay check in over a year is coming in on Monday, so I am pretty excited about that. I'm trying to figure out where to send that money, and then JP blurts out "Remember that Alex and I are going down south hunting next weekend" so he's saying that he wants me to not pay extra on some bill, because he wants to use it to go hunting. A little bitter at first, but in reality it is a good thing. I'm all for Alex and his dad going pheasant hunting, spending some good quality guy time together. So fine, bills can be paid, but not overpaid. JP's relationship with his son is more important.

So, with all this health crap going on, I'd just like to say that I'm so happy that we have insurance. I cannot imagine trying to raise a family without it. I will not get political, and I do not know enough about it to have a hard and fast opinion, I just think it's sad that so many people in this country do not have insurance. Cannot imagine.