Shit

Between my many prenatal visits and my newfound gestational diabetes, I thought I’d let Shane take Hunter to the doctor today. As Dr. Treece is a decent pediatrician, I made the decision to transfer Hunter into a new practice. I felt that he required more attention than his current St. Luke’s pediatrician. It would only seem fit that my husband shares the parental responsibility. I had faith in my husband even though he wasn’t privy to the doctor’s office.


No sooner than I walked into my office, my phone rang.“Hey it’s me.”
“What’s up?”
“I’m filling out all these forms and I don’t know who to put down for emergency?”
“Put Laurie down she’s very accessible.”
“What about Jill?”
“Yes, but she never answers her phone when she’s working. I put Laurie down for everything.”
“Alright, I’ll put Jill on here.”
“Why did you call me, if you’ve made up your mind?” I was perturbed that he was unable to make a decision without jabbing me with the irritation serum.
“You don’t understand. I have like a million forms to fill out.” He was flabbergasted.
“Um yeh, so what? It takes like two seconds. I do it every time I go to my doctor’s visits.”
“Well I don’t fill them out as fast as you do.”
“Shane it is not a quiz or a test, just fill it out. I gotta go.”


My confidence in my husband’s self – efficiency began to droll. No sooner than a pigeon could crap on a bald head, the phone rang again. “Hey I have the doctor here with me, can I put her on the phone?”
“Sure.” I could’ve pricked his scrotum with a thousand needles as I was taken away from my project.
“Hi Shellie, it’s Dr. Moore and I’m here with Hunter and your husband. He was uncertain as to a few questions so I hope it’s an okay time to talk.” Her voice pleasant and calm, “How many words does Hunter know?”
“About seven.” Side swiped by the inquiry, Dr. Treece was never this interested.
“Alright. How often does he drink from a bottle?”
“He drinks three bottles of formula at night.”
“Oh we need to get him off the milk and formula.” She was appalled. “He should’ve been off of the bottle and milk at one year old.”
“Alright doctor.” I quickly felt inept and in the dark.
“What’s his eating habits like?”
“Well, I only see him total three hours a day. As far as I know his daycare says he eats a lot, but he never really eats dinner nor breakfast with us. Otherwise, I’m not sure what his day eating habits are as I’m not there.”
“Alright. We need to move him off the bottle and on to a sippy cup. He needs to drink more water. This in exchange will increase his eating habits. The more milk he drinks the more it stunts his hunger. Also we need to wean him off the pacifier to prevent his teeth from getting well…you know.”
“Alright doctor, we’ll try our best.” I kicked myself for not being one of those edgy and uptight mothers that lived by the word according to Dr. Sears. Today, I felt like a donkeys behind.


Later that evening, I inquired about his weight and height. My husband shrugged. I was upset that he didn’t take interest. Husband was upset that I didn’t understand that he had to get Hunter undressed to put him on the scale and dressed again. Case in point, he was too busy dressing Hunter to take note. I wondered if all fathers uninterested, or just mine. My hormones were clawing for an argument; instead I counted my blessings and told my hormones to calm the heck down. In a quick reassessment, my husband has acted on his own accord in more ways than I can count. I found no reason to persecute him? I buried the hatchet for there was no need for the inquisition this evening.



“C’mon Hunter let’s go.” Shane hustled Hunter out the front door.
“Shit!” I dropped my mascara on the bathroom floor. “I’ll meet you in the car in a second.” The door closed behind Shane. I gathered my things and headed down the stairs. “You just taught your son a new word.” Shane laughed, “s-h-i-t.”
“No.” I stammered.
“Oh yeh, he said it like eight times walking down the front steps.” Shane chuckled at my parenting skills.
“No, are you serious?” Is it that time? Is he my precious sopping sponge of knowledge? Could it be?
“Oh yes, mommy just taught Hunter a new word right?” Shane reversed the car out of the driveway.
“Sit, sit, sit.” Hunter repeated in his car seat waving to the invisible circus outside of his passenger window.
“Dude, he’s saying sit, not s-h-i-t.” I fumbled around in my head grasping the last word my precious sweet baby overheard before being whisked away by his father. He was right I did just add another new word to his list of vocabulary.


“I will let Dr. Moore know that he knows eight words now.” My husband so glad that I was too was human. We both chortled. Hunter repeated the mildest of cuss words. If we didn’t curb our swearing ways, Hunter’s vocabulary was about to take a toll for the interesting.


This is Shellie relieved that the world is a better place, because it feels so natural to go against the grain back to you Bob at the studio!