Navigating the Doctor's Office

Time to celebrate!  Why? Because I managed to take both boys to their doctor appointments.  No big deal right?  I've been doing it for years now.  Except these were PORTUGUESE doctor appointments and who actually learns medical terms during your first weeks of language class?  

I fretted about it for days.  Grady, my go-to-make-him-talk-in-another-language-I-don't-fully-understand guy, had class but I have no classes on Thursday afternoons.  Lucky me, I thought.  Gah, how am I supposed to do this?  

First victory of the day?  I used my Portuguese to let the ladies at the Creche (Lucas' daycare) know I had to pick him up early for a doctor appointment - yahoo!  And guess what, when I got there, they were actually expecting me.  It's like they understood! :) 

Google maps worked and I found the building, but it turned out to be a complex structure with poor signage, in Portuguese.  Sigh.  I found an office and took a ticket (Portuguese offices love the number ticket system) even though I had no idea what I was taking a ticket for.  It worked, and I got to talk to someone and ask where in the world I was supposed to go.  Go outside, head around to the other side, in to the elevator and up to the third floor.  We've got this Diego!  Or not.  Third floor, another wait for the receptionist.  She kindly checked her computer to find me the right place to go.  Then it was up to the fourth floor.  But there were no signs saying whose office it was, no one was home AND the door was locked.  So it was time to wait and hope that they were just late getting back from lunch and that we were finally in the right place.  Tick.  Tock.  Tick.  Tock.  Do we wait or go back down?  Finally we head back downstairs but as we arrive we hear people walking on the floorboards above and rush back up.  

With much patience and kindness on the part of the receptionists, nurse and doctor we made it through both checkups for the boys.  Height, weight, conversations on diets and baby activities, a prescription for Lucas vitamins AND translated vaccination records all done!  Explanations on Diego's allergies, asthma and current medications - done!  Letters of health certification for their schools - done!  It might not have been pretty or correct Portuguese throughout, but all the points were covered and understood!  When the doctor learned we were moving to Mozambique after this she jumped right on the need to start those vaccinations as well and understood me explaining which ones we had already gotten and why we were waiting for others.

(When you move around with kids, you end up with quite the collection of vaccination records - Costa Rica, Tennessee, Washington and Portugal)

Whew, I got out of that office feeling like I had been run through the wringer and come out on top of the world!  Grady suggested I thank him for giving me this opportunity to triumph . . .  I'm not sure I go that far, but it did feel good (in the end).

So, what does it teach me?  Maybe I will finally start learning to let tomorrow's problems wait until tomorrow before I worry.  

It wasn't until I got home that I realized what I forgot... to tell them about the dead plant Lucas knocked over in their waiting room and all the dirt on their floor.  Whoops, sorry!

Ironically, when I started the next week of classes... we were studying all health related vocabulary.

(So this is celebrating my birthday and not the appointment's success, but aren't they cute!?)

(Diego-Mommy date to Santa-Clara-a-Velha, a convent that was once underwater in Coimbra.)