I hate shots.
That's actually quite the understatement.
When I was in college, I injured my back and had to quit track and eventually quit volleyball. Doctors never really knew what was wrong with my back. I tried lots of things - physical therapy, all kinds of prep before and treatments after sports practices, and even cortisone shots.
I went in for the cortisone shots knowing how much I hate shots, and hearing how big the needle is for a cortisone shot...so I never even looked. I turned my back and leaned over the table, lifted up my sweatshirt, and tried to mentally prepare for the shots. The doctor injected me about 10 different times, in order to spread the cortisone around.
After the shots, I attempted to stand back up...and don't remember much else as the world went black.
The next few seconds probably seemed like hours, at least for the doctor. In addition to him grabbing my sweatshirt to keep me from falling on the floor, he noticed a screech that came from the doorway with my mother yelling hysterically "you killed my daughter!"
Apparently an overly dramatic response to shots runs in the family.
I'm quite certain the doctor didn't know what to do with the two of us. I had to stay in the office for a couple hours because anytime I tried to get up, I felt woozy all over again.
I was told I have a condition that affects the way I react to needles.
I have had to get many shots since those dreadful cortisone shots. I've traveled to multiple countries around the world that required shots, and I've given birth twice and had to receive multiple blood tests and shots.
It hasn't gotten any better.
It's a mental condition. I know the shot doesn't hurt. Everyone tells me that in an attempt to reassure me, but I know. It's totally mental.
So it's no wonder that I apparently passed this trait on to my overly-dramatic daughter.
Adele has never ever done well with shots. Starting with her two-month appointment in Costa Rica, she has always reacted poorly to shots. It didn't help that in Costa Rica, the nurse would take her time in between each injection. Not like in the U.S., where the kid is injected with 3 needles practically at the same time. In Costa Rica, Adele received a shot, had to wait in agony while the nurse prepared the second shot, and so forth.
The "waiting in agony" might have been me. I was the one standing in the corner with my back turned, tears falling down my face, as David was the hero holding her down on the table.
Adele always had a fever that spiked after her shots as well. One time she even had minor convulsions because of a high fever.
Now that she's a bit older, she actually understands going to the doctor and getting shots.
It's worse.
The last time we were at the doctor's and she needed shots, it took 2-3 days for her to get over it. And we're not talking just mentally. The girl could hardly walk because she complained about her legs hurting from shots.
It was pitiful. We had to carry her around, and not touch her legs as best as possible.
Here's the kicker - Adele received a couple of stickers after getting shots, so she put them on her legs down by her knees. All it took was a few hours, and somehow she got a mental block on where her shots actually were. Somehow mentally, those shots had migrated and were now under her stickers.
The bandaids fell off easy enough...but the stickers were sticky.
My ridiculous daughter wouldn't let us touch her stickers and complained about the owies underneath them for days after she could finally walk again. The only way we could get the stickers off was to let Adele sit in the bathtub for a long time and eventually those stickers fell off.
So it's been months since Adele's had shots. And yet, stickers and bandaids have the same effect on her - with or without a shot or an injury.
Just the other day, she complained about her leg hurting, so David put a bandaid on it.
Ahh, the power of suggestion.
All of a sudden, within hours, that bandaid was covering a serious injury. It somehow grew astronomically in her mind. And that injury was so serious that Adele wouldn't even wear pants for a couple days because the pants would touch the bandaid and make her injury hurt worse.
It's a good thing the boys in our family aren't over-dramatic wusses...apparently Adele and I both need them to keep us grounded.
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