Horrible Morning

We had what could rank as one of the worst mornings of our life...Mia had to have blood work done today. Just routine blood counts for her 9 month check up. I guess they figure the kids aren't getting shots at this visit...why not do blood work. We went in this morning, and of course had to wait a while to be seen. My stomach was turning flips just thinking about what was about to happen. When we finally were called back, the lady tried put the elastic band on both arms, but never seemed feel a good vein...but ended up sticking a freakin' huge needle in her arm anyway and "digging" around to get it positioned where she thought the vein was. Meanwhile, Mia is shrieking, I'm balling and Dale is on the verge of tears. Mia was so upset. She was hot and sweaty, and had those horrible "crying heaves" with huge tears running down her face. The lady finally stops searching and takes the needle out of her arm with no blood collected. I thought to myself..."There is no way I am letting her try the other arm...there has to be another way". The lady gave me a tissue and asked if we needed a minute to calm her down (and let me regain my composure). I told her no, we just wanted to get this over with. She then proceeds to put the elastic band around Mia's forearm, so she could look for a vein in her hand to draw from. Mia now knew what that meant, so she started to get upset again and fight back harder...she didn't want to be stuck again. For a 9 month old, she sure is strong. Not finding a good vein there either (thankfully she didn't try "digging" for one in her hand...I think I might of had to hurt her), she told us she was going to have to do a finger stick. I told her that was fine...what ever she had to do to just get it done. The finger stick was traumatic in it's own right. They don't use what you think of as a traditional finger stick. The device makes a long cut in the finger, not just a small hole like a blood sugar finger stick. Then they have to "milk" the finger to fill up two small tubes full of blood. It takes a couple of minutes of doing this milking to get enough blood for the tests they have to run. But she wasn't screaming near as loud as she was when the lady was "digging" around for a good vein.


By the time we got home, she was fine. She kept showing me the band-aid on her finger, but other than that, you would have never know it happened. It is amazing how rezilent kids are. Dale and I may be scared for life, but Mia's fine. :)