One of those days...

My last morning of August went something like this... Samara's normal 9:00am wake-up (love it) was pushed up to 7:00. It's not unusual, but it just happened to be one of those mornings, after a few hours of sleep here and there, that I was desperate for a moment's silence. But, nevermind. Landon's up, Sammy's up, it's 97 degrees by about 8am, must get busy. We walk to the post office. As we're climbing the stairs to go in, a dog is spotted. Medium sized, coffee brown, panting on this disgustingly hot day. Samara is crazy afraid of dogs... for no reason, just crazy, crazy horror-movie-style afraid. I try to calm her, while holding Landon (one of the hardest things about having two tiny ones) but hope shuffling her into the building will make her forget... Not so much. The man with the dog brings him INTO the post office and she loses it. Now, this is no seeing-eye dog. Is this necessary?! When she loses, Landon loses it. Two screaming babies, a clueless old man who doesn't know what is wrong, and then...my shorts around my knees. Samara, in her hysteria, pulled them down. Yeah. Gorgeous. Mummy always said wear a nice pair of underwear everyday incase you end up in an ambulance. Cheerful yes, but this is worse! Did I still mail the letter? Yes. I figured with two absolutely shrieking children and my day old undies revealed to the whole town, what more could go wrong?

It's 10am now and we have worse things ahead. Samara's RAST test for her very out-of-the-blue, oh-so-sad peanut butter reaction yesterday looms. Doctor's appointments are hard enough, shots, the worst, but five tubes of blood taken by four nurses holding her down, while she gags, hyperventilates and near shatters my heart over and over again is just too much to bear. I think beyond wishing this peanut allergy is non-existent in and of itself, more than dreading a life of reading labels and worrying what will happen when I'm not there to check for her, I dread the next test. As ever, I am taken to that heart-wrenching place when I imagine the many, many families whose days are consistently filled with episodes like these. To see your child in pain is so debilitating and while trying to be her hero, her strength, the tears are fighting to explode. I can't say she did well, nor did I, and it'll be 10 whole days until we hear the explanation behind yesterday's hives. For now, I'm just glad today is over.