Arden 12 months

Okay. Arden is actually 14 months – well, almost 15 months old – but it's the first time in three months that she's been well enough to have her well-baby check up. The doctors just wanted to make sure she was good and healthy before they pumped her full of about a zillion different God awful viruses. As if four painful, stinging, screaming shots wasn't enough, the nurse attempted to milk an entire vile of blood out of a pinprick in the tip of Arden's finger. About 10 minutes in, I suggested she lower Arden's arm below the heart - get basic anatomy on her side.

I decided to see the nurse practitioner this time instead of the pediatrician since the latter has the bedside manner of doorknob. I'd been really happy with the NP during the past few sick-baby visits. But, this time she rubbed me the wrong way. And then, somehow, everything that came out of my mouth made me seem like a freakish obsessive mom.

We got off to a bad start at the begining of our appt. when the NP immediately made a snide remark about the pacifier Arden was sucking. I've been trying to ween Arden off sucking her fingers, which she does compulsively, and onto a pacifier, and I'm having some small successes - in the car, at the store . . . I'd far rather she suck the Nuk than her fingers after she's touched everything in the germy doctor's office. I said something to that effect and got a "Germs are everywhere honey and babies are going to put their fingers in their mouth no matter what you do" lecture like I, of all people, was some sort of germ freak. So then I had to explain that if she could see the state of my kitchen she would know that germs are not my issue.

A few minutes further into the conversation we were on the subject of talking, and I was running through the few things that Arden says (hi, bye, mama, dada, thank you, bye bye dada) adding that it doesn't seem like much, but that Sawyer was slow bloomer on the language front. And the NP told me that Arden was "smart" - as if she could tell that in those two minutes - in case I needed the reassurance that in fact my baby was worth keeping. And then she said that if I took the pacifier away Arden might TALK MORE! I felt the need to explain that she doesn't run around with the pacifier in her mouth all the time. The backpedaling and explaining was only making me feel more psycho by the minute. Then I truly blew her away when I told her that neither of my children will eat roasted chicken. Like she had NEVER HEARD OF THAT BEFORE.

I should have known better at that point than to ask about Arden's bowleggedness and to wonder, out loud, whether a chiropractor could help. The look of ridicule on that woman's face made me feel like the high school cheerleader who accidentally showed up for a debate team meeting. "A chiropractor . . . for bowlegs?" (She came back in a few minutes later, apologized for blowing off my chiropractor question and gave me the standard lecture on working side-by-side with alternative medicine and how it would do no harm if I felt compelled to waste my money).

In retrospect, this is the same woman who shouted at Arden when she touched the outlet cover (something that I had decided to not hold against her initially). I will, needless to say, never take my children to see her again. (If I can help it.)

Arden, according to the Nurse Nazi, is 50th percentile for height and weight - for a 14 month old - and is as smart as an 18 month old. Time to sign her up for college!