Monday, March 5, 2012

parent alert!

Am doing my civic duty on behalf of all the families who had appointments at my pediatrician's office today, as it seems 100% of the parents in the well-child side had no idea that the large space with all the chairs is a space designed for WAITING. So I'm letting you know now - it's called a WAITING ROOM. Meant for WAITING while your doctor is busy seeing other children.

Moreover - and I'll cut a couple of you a little slack since you are clearly new parents - you might want to take note that Monday mornings are always busy...with all the kids that got sick over the weekend...and during cold season, all bets are off. Waiting for an hour is not unheard of. Do you see all the sniffling, sneezing, miserable kids & parents on the other side of the beautiful salt water fish tank? When it's you over there, you are going to be awfully glad the doctor accommodates your sick child.

And special note to the Dad who was bouncing his adorable daughter, probably one, on his knee, as she teetered on the edge of a tantrum, when you'd only been there about 15 minutes, singing loud enough for everyone to hear, "Dr. Jones doesn't care about us! He always just leaves us waiting out here! He's just in this for the money!" - you have got to be kidding me. I sure hope you don't say these kinds of things to her when she's old enough to understand what you're saying. And let me just mention that all three of my kids have been seeing Dr. Jones for years, for a reason, and I take that personally.

But I almost took the gloves off when you walked up to the front desk after, oh, 20 minutes and said to them, "How long is it going to be? What if she gets hungry?" What? Seriously? What right-minded parent doesn't have an emergency meal on hand for their one year old? And when on earth did it become the responsibility of the front desk staff to see that your child has enough to eat? I almost blew a gasket.

At that point, all three parents, including Dad of the Year, got on their cell phones to bitch at their spouses/significant others about the atrocious wait times; lucky for them, because they really were about to get a lecture from me. Ironically, all three got called in, one after the other, while they were on the phone.

All this while I waited an hour and a half to talk to Dr. Jones, who took time out on what was clearly an incredibly busy Monday to talk to me during his lunch hour when I did not have an appointment. Bad doctor my ass. So angry.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

And the sad truth is that these same parents will be the ones that persecute teachers and school administrators for mis-behavior their kids may do. Oh, but it won't be the kids fault...

-Sonia