The Princess has the croup, mainly some sneezing, the barking cough, and a pretty stubborn and hot fever. This is an infection, and even though I am conservative about antibiotics, I think she needs a course of them. So this morning (FriSunday), I was glad to have friends tell me that the pediatric hospital right down the road from our house was open and recommended. So she and I arrived there at 9:45 AM.
Here is what my experience was like--all of it very pleasant but, as I explain below, bewildering as well. There was no talking except where I indicate:
Easily find location.
Easily park.
Walk in front door.
Greeted by Filipina hospital workers in pink standing at desk to right, "Hello!"
Waiting room is almost empty.
Another lady with child, in niqab (facial covering with eye holes) tells my in broken English, "get number."
Turn to lady in pink, get number. Lady in pink smiles and points me to desk across the way.
Walk to desk across the way. Get out insurance cards.
Lady in niqab behind desk speaks almost no English, hands me a form and say "name, birthday, phone number."
Fill these in.
Offer insurance cards. She takes one and ignores the other.
Receive printout and another number.
"Room 4."
Walk to room 4, where a nurse says hellos and takes girlchild's vitals.
Emphasize persistent fever, still hot after Ibuprofin dose an hour ago.
"Room 2."
Time elapsed since entering the building: 2 minutes.
Walk back across to room 2.
Girlchild is told to lay on table, flat on her back.
Not-very-pleasant Dr. Man with very very thick accent (Egyptian, I think) walks up, says nothing to either of us, listens to girlchild's heart/lungs, pokes her belly, looks in her ears, and shoves a tongue depressor in her mouth so quickly and without any warning that she gags.
Dr. Man looks at me, "Any disease?"
-----Pause story-------
Now, at least I think I know what he means...like "does she have any history of major illnesses?" The real answer, thankfully, is no. But the real real answer is that she has a sort of asthmatic reaction to dust and as part of having a cold where she coughs until she vomits. Her US doctor has known this and we have puzzled over it and it could be a sort of asthma or not we're not really sure but is this a "disease"? I decide to say no, but now I've hesitated, so I have to say something...
---------------------------
Me: "Only allergies, especially to dust. But I know what she has now is croup--she has the seal bark. [insert seal bark noises and envision Dr. Man looking at me oddly] Her fever is bad. I need antibiotic."
Dr. Man says nothing and walks to a desk outside of the examination area.
Get Hannah off the table and follow.
He fills out a form and says things to me. I make out "once a day" and "as needed" as he points to item 1 and items 2 and 3 on the list. He hands me a paper.
Wonder where to go next.
Time elapsed since walking in the building: 6 minutes.
Go back to the helpful ladies in pink, who point me to window 3.
On my way to window 3, I pass a lady in a niqab with four very young kids. The youngest is sick but still as cute as anything. I smile at the eyes behind the veil, look at the baby, and say "jameel" (beautiful). Her eyes smile big back at me and she nods. As I walk away I hear her laugh good naturedly and said to her husband "jameel!" most likely surprised that I knew any Arabic.
Make sure to pick the "ladies" line, even though a man is standing in it. The lady line is separated from the man line by a small partition.
A lady at window 3 takes the paper that the doctor has just given me and hands me back a page and a sticker. She says nothing.
Follow the man who had come to the window first to another window.
Hand the paper and sticker in through the slot.
After much calculation and figuring, the man in this booth says, "seven riyales" (<$2.00). I give it to him. He hands me a receipt.
Follow the guy in front of me back to window 3.
Hand her my receipt.
She gives me FIVE bottles of medicine.
Put them in a bag and ask her "finished?" "Finished," she says.
Meanwhile, Hannah has made friends with the family I spoke to. She is sitting with them, and the little ones are looking at her with some adoring faces. I look at my girlchild. She has on two skirts, a long one under a short one to create her signature "wedding cake tiered look" and she has on a bright pink Old Navy shirt with a giant American flag on it.
We trade lots of smiles and gestures and "mash'Allah" (blessings on the babies) and "ma salams" with this family and then walk out the door.
12 minutes and $1.75 later, we are back in the car.
It's hard to explain, but this hospital adventure just reminded me of a feeling of clueless almost-no-control that I vividly remember from our first days her. You go through mandatory fingerprinting, blood drawing, and other processes to get your residency permit in a world of almost all Arabic. People point to places, and you walk there. You suddenly feel weird, because you only know what to do when they tell you what to do. When they don't tell you, you are lost. You have to trust that people are good and kind and not out to make a fool of you or take advantage of you. Once you're settled, these experiences don't happen much any more (going to the police department after a traffic accident is surely another place these feelings happen, but that's different, too). It's good and humbling to have to stumble around trying to figure it out because there are non-English speakers who have to do that, too. I'm just lucky to speak the Lingua Franca. But the silence and the chopped exchanges and the lack of certainty over communication and the general surreal feeling of clueless grasping is an odd experience. The blessing of going through a full-service hospital visit and prescription filling for $1.75 is beyond surreal as well.
Then we got home, and I looked up the meds. I always look them up first because otherwise, I have no idea what drugs I'm giving my children...we now have a giant bottle of children's Claritin, 2 bottles of ibuprofin, and 1 bottle of acetaminaphen. Despite trying to explain to the doctor that she has croup and a fever (and I need antibiotics), all he heard was my "disease" answer...allergies.
If girlchild is not better in the morning, we'll try for antibiotics again at another clinic.
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