Dr. Dr.

General practitioner, neurologist, gynecologist (she loves this one - NOT), who else? We have virtually no records and getting what we can is accomplished so now we move forward with obtaining appointments. Oh yeh, her ankle hurts...add orthopedic doctor too.

It's not too hard making the appointments, thankfully we have been fairly lucky in getting appointments with our preferred doctors and them taking Medicare as well as Medicaid (Illinois Department of Human Services insurance). Well, sort of. My general practitioner isn't taking any new patients with Medicare. Great. I want to talk to the Dr. Wait...same with the gynecologist. What? Crap. I will talk to her as I have an appointment coming up myself. Both docs say fine..make another phone call.

It's amazing how long the phone calls can take. Of course, it doesn't help that I hate talking on the phone so I do tend to procrastinate a teeny bit. But I am also trying to fit the calls into the work day in a way so as not to disrupt my work. Uh, right.

I take Sharon to the general practitioner. Yep, time off work. Appointment goes well, they want to take blood since there is no record for it. Make another appointment (more time off work). See Neurologist. Time off work. Appointment runs very late, but that is okay because I made the appointment for the end of the day. He does a few assessments that take about 2 minutes and proclaims that all is well and we should see him in a year unless she has a major seizure. Honestly, overall we like him, but we aren't really sure what to expect from a neurologist so we kind of nod our heads and I make a note in my spiral notebook that is getting quite full.

The gynecologist appointment is joyful. Note to others: think about female stuff if you are about to take on a female sibling. She doesn't manage her monthly stuff well (my God, I didn't expect to have to deal with this?! Why didn't I think of this?!!!!) and I certainly did not think that I would need to sit in the doctor office WHILE SHE HAS HER PAP TEST! The farthest corner was not far enough away, but it was a pretty corner as I stood facing it :) Appointment went swimmingly - so to speak - but we will see the doctor again as we have decided Sharon should have uterine eblasion to eliminate (or significantly reduce) her flow each month. Yep, more time off work.

Ortho doc...crap, MRI; follow up appointment - CRAP...now we are going to be doing physical therapy. Yep yep yep...when am I going to get my work laptop so I can work while I am at these appointments?!

Note to self - yes, we are doing a great thing for Sharon, but if there were ever a next time...there are a TON more things we needed to consider before saying yes. We knew this was going to be challenging, but that word doesn't nearly cover it.