So upon hearing that I was sick, 7-year-old Brianne came into my office and decided that I needed a “pediatric”. She purposefully walked up to me, put her hand on my shoulder and then pulled out two Popsicle sticks from her pocket. I knew exactly where this was going.
“Open up” she said. “I don’t want to,” I replied. “You have to, I’m your pediatric.” So dutifully, I opened up and she stuck the Popsicle stick in my mouth and pulled it back out. Thankfully, it didn’t trigger my gag reflex as doctor’s usually do. I looked closely at the stick and found that there were bits of pocket lint still attached to the stick. I wonder just how much of that actually ended up in my mouth?
“Yep,” she said, “You’re sick. I have just what you need.” She then walked over to her backpack and pulled out two pretzel sticks. “Eat these.” “I don’t want to.” “You have to, you’re sick.” “I’ll only eat one if you eat one.” “Ok.” And we both ate.
She then pulled out two, (what I can only hope were) spicy goldfish crackers. They were peppered with little black dots. “Eat these.” “I don’t want to.” “You have to,” she insisted and started to press them into my lips. “Fine,” I said. And I ate them. The black dots were indeed spice, but I wasn’t sure what else was mixed in with them.
Finally, seeing that I wasn’t giving an “appropriate” response to her medication attempts, she decided to pull out the big guns…and danced and twirled around my office. After her little show she came back up to me, put her hand on my shoulder and said, “How do you feel now?” “Much better, Doctor.” “Pediatric,” she said.
