This morning, I asked the older kids, "How much do you guys love Elle?" Tons! Lots! "Would you do anything for her? Would you try your hardest to keep her safe?" Of course! "Because Elle has asthma, we absolutely cannot let her get swine flu. You guys would be sick but she would be very, very sick. So we all need to go get vaccinated. Will you guys do that for Elle?" Solemnly, they all nodded their heads and said yes.
So today was our day. Lucky for me, our local health department finally got their act together and streamlined the process. We got to the place at 9, stood in line for 5 minutes to be assigned the time of 11:00 for vaccination ... and then went and played for 2 hours. We spent a good hour at Toys R Us playing with everything under the sun, went to Barnes & Noble and read books and had a snack, and even met some new friends at Old Navy.
Then it was time to head back to get the vaccine, which immediately started the tears going for Paige. She quietly cried, and cried, and cried. And cried. She kept looking up at me and said, "I'm trying to be brave!" She wouldn't even come out for a picture, though. Poor girl was too darn scared. It didn't help that we could hear all of the little kids ahead of us crying as they got their shots.
Then the nurse told Paige that she could have the mist instead of the shot. All smiles after that, let me tell you. We stood in line maybe 10 minutes to have all 4 kids vaccinated and that was it! I was very impressed with the efficiency of it all. Yes, we'll have to do it again in a month but even Paige admitted that she won't be scared at all next time. Hallelujah.
5 comments:
Okay, so how does this work now? We have to go back for our 2nd dose in a couple of weeks. Our first time was a nightmare, standing in line for TWO hours. What's the secret now?
You are so good at presenting things in such a persuasive way. I've said numerous times that being a mom is actually marketing... you are the master!
Not looking forward to the booster mist here in a couple of weeks (If given the choice I would have made Jameson get the injection). But I have to confess, The Huz stood in line for me the first time. He streamlined it to 5 minutes for this girl.
It sounds like the health dept. really had it all together. I'm SOOOO glad you didn't have to wait in line for hours! Toys R Us is better. :)
I'm glad you could get the vacine. We had the regular flu shot before the MTC. The health department said we would only need the flu shot for the MTC and the airplane. We had hoped the other vacine would be ready before we left, but it wasn't.
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