Poor little thing...

Today has been crammed with that word - over and over again. Weird

First, Justin was sick Last night, so this morning I got up early for animal duty, and then went off to work. Before I went, I stopped in to talk to Jerra, where I mentioned that he had been up most of the night, poor little thing.

Then coming back from my fish-for lunch trip, I got in the left hand lane to turn into work, only to be clipped by a 17 year old girl driving her dad's BMW and making an illegal left hand turn. She looked like she might lose it any minute, and it just broke my heart. Poor little thing. She reminded me a lot of Bear, and I just felt so bad for her. Scared her to death.

The saddest part, when her dad showed up and apologized to me, he said she had "issues" Stunned, I replied that I had babies the same age - and that all kids these days have some issues. I told him I was fine and that it was an innocent mistake. Thinking to myself "this man just told a total stranger that his daughter had problems - odds are her issues are that her dad is focused on money and lets a 17 year old drive a BMW".

I arrived back at the office, tried to salvage some fish that wasn't soaked by ice water when the wreck happened and relaxed for a minute.

Then my patient showed up. A pretty lady who has had gestational diabetes twice now, and would have to start using insulin. The longer she talked, the more I could tell there was something else. It seems that in an effort to encourage her compliance, someone told her that the high sugars would kill her unborn child..... yea, I'll give that a minute to sink in.

Suffice it to say that what should have taken an hour took about 90 minutes and she was terrified - poor little thing. In the end it all worked out.

Now, I tend to be blunt - honest, but blunt when I talk to people about diabetes (got diabetes, send me a note and I'll tell you) but why in the world do people assume that just because someone speaks Spanish they are stupid? Why would you scare a woman like that - into not sleeping, not eating, feeling like she is keeping a terrible truth from her husband - it was just plain wrong and will warrant a conversation from me when I have cooled off a bit. Scare tactics are barbaric and they don't' do anything but carve years off a person life. No excuse to behave that way - not when there is good clinical evidence to back up recommendations instead.