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Main Page Site Index Getting Pregnant Pregnancy Parenting Pregnancy and Parenting Journals	by Jonathan Kronstadt Ears are odd little configurations of flesh, but you can tell a lot about a person from the way they look--and work. Mine, for example, are beginning to sport wispy tufts of hair in places that were once mercifully bald. This means I am old. My daughter's are adorable on the outside, but inside are steaming cauldrons of bacteria and other medically bad stuff, causing her to develop an ear infection about every 11 minutes. She's been to the pediatrician so often that she actually had the following discussion with her preschool teacher: Teacher: What do you smell with? Alison: Your nose. Teacher: And what do you touch with? Alison: Your fingers. Teacher: And what do you listen with? Alison: A stethoscope. She has had so many ear infections we buy Amoxycillin at the Price Club. Fortunately, she responds well to antibiotics. Unfortunately, toddler antibiotics are revolting substances--thick, chalky, and eerily colored like the goo that seeps from some wounded alien. The markings on our dosage spoon are permanently clouded over from incessant use, but there's a well-worn thumb groove at the one teaspoon mark for instant reference. At least I think it's the one teaspoon mark. We've been lucky in that this barrage of infections has not affected her hearing in the slightest. I know this because every time I mutter under my breath some less than flattering assessment of someone else's driving she not only repeats it immediately but sets it to music. Her pattern is unmistakable. Runny nose, followed by a middle-of-the-night waking caused by fluid build-up caused by horizontal body positioning and that pesky gravity. She rarely runs a fever or seems really sick, so the problem is that by the time she wakes up she's had five or six good hours of sleep and is ready to party. We're not. I always think it's a discipline problem and my wife always thinks it's an ear infection. Needless to say, I am never right. So we call her pediatrician at 9:01 the next morning, get put on hold for about six months, then try to get squeezed in for an appointment. The worst part is opening the door to the office and discovering just how high the plague level is in there. I look around and swear to myself that every child in the room looks like they have the ebola virus. We know why we're there, so the only suspense lies in finding out which ear--sometimes it's both--is the infected one. She's been there so often she knows all the doctors and nurses by name. Imagine my pride. Once we were dispatched to a specialist, who talked to us about the possibility of having tubes surgically implanted to help hasten her ear drainage. Since there's no hearing problem the only up side was to stop the infections. The down side included: a) the tubes coming out too soon; b) the tubes not coming out when they were supposed to and having to be surgically removed; c) the tubes not doing what they are supposed to while they're in; and d) the remote but terrifying prospects of complications due to general anesthesia. Taking a page from the little one's book, we ran out of the office screaming, after making our copayment, of course. Twice our girl has come down with ear infections on Sunday, when finding our pediatrician is tougher than convincing her that just because Bill Clinton lives in the White House doesn't necessarily mean that Bob Dole lives in a red house. Once, after much wringing of hands, we prevailed upon a friendly cardiologist who lives nearby, and he brought over his medical ear-snooper and wrote us a prescription. Another time we were at an out-of-town party when it happened, but found yet another accommodating cardiologist. He didn't have an ear-snooper on him but corroborated our diagnosis anyway. Probably didn't want to spoil his appetite by looking at Alison's ear innards, which by now must look like Dresden after the bombing. They say that kids usually grow out of the whole ear infection thing around age 3, so we're hoping that this was the last winter of our discontent. I'm especially hopeful, as I'd like to move on to being wrong about something else for a change. This work is copyrighted by the author, Jonathan Kronstadt. Reproduction of any kind is prohibited with out the express consent of the author. Please feel free to let Jonathan know what you think of his work by sending him an email.