Tears of Laughter

In one of my favorite pictures of Matt, he is sitting in the kitchen, obviously in the midst of a belly laugh, with a tear drop glistening on his cheek.

Tears tracking down his cheek was not an unusual sight. I mentioned it to his pediatrician at one of his early appointment. She told me that one of his eye ducts was not open and that we'd watch it. If it was still unopened by his first birthday, she'd have him see an eye doctor. So, after his first birthday, we saw the eye doctor and Matt was subsequently scheduled for a minor eye surgery for when he was eighteen months to open the eye duct.

While obviously not as serious as heart surgery, any time you are put under there is a risk. I gave both the eye doctor and anesthesiologist Matt's medical history. I remember being very calm while I waited for them to finish with Matt.

The eye doctor came into the waiting room with a very stern expression on his face. I had a moment of pure fear while I waited for him to give me obviously terrible news. I remember thinking I had relaxed and let my defenses drop and was going to be punished for that. The doctor sat next to me and told me that the procedure had gone fine but he needed to talk to me.

Did I realize that because Matt had had heart surgery that before Matt had any invasive procedure, including seeing a dentist, that he had to have a prophylactic? I slowly nodded my head. Matt's cardiologist had told me that before he sees a dentist he'll have to take an antibiotic but as he did not have many teeth Matt had yet to see a dentist. The doctor nodded to me and said that it is more than just seeing the dentist, for any invasive procedure, including the procedure that Matt had just undertaken, Matt would need a prophylactic prior to the procedure.

The eye doctor told me that luckily the anesthesiologist has spoken to me directly before the procedure and thus knew that Matt needed a prophylactic and delayed the procedure until after it had been administered. The eye doctor told me that upon hearing Matt's medical history that any doctor or dentist who does work on Matt SHOULD know that they needed to make sure he was so protected before they do anything to him, but that I shouldn't assume they would know. For example, I had told the eye doctor about Matt's heart surgery while giving him Matt's medical history but the eye doctor had not remembered that such a patient needed a prophylactic. That as his mother, I should make sure to directly inform each and everyone of that fact.

The incident shook up both the doctor and me. I also took his advise to heart and have made it my responsibility to inform everyone of his need of a prophylactic before any invasive procedure, like teeth cleaning.