Lying is one answer

Uso mo houben

The other day, I took the day off to get a breast biopsy. Yes, a breast biopsy, you know, what you do when you get an abnormal breast exam and/ or mammogram and the surgeon does to make sure it isn't cancer? Yes, that. But I didn't want to deal with explaining to my husband what a Category 3 breast lesion was, and how stabbing it with a needle and sucking out some cells involved a blood-draw-caliber needle was more a precaution than anything. I don't know if he would have been "oh, ok" like he was supposed to, or if he would have freaked out like I was afraid he would. I wasn't ready for the latter. So that morning, I packed a lunch just like almost every other day the past two weeks, and left the house when I usually did. The procedure was done by 10:30, so I drove to the mall and ate the lunch I packed in the parking lot and bought a T shirt at Uniqlo (last year's shirts were on sale at 50% off and I found the discontinued color I liked) and walked around until it was time for my consultant gig. After I finished that gig, I went to Costco and the adjacent home improvement store, and then I went to Starbucks (and remembered to NOT get a decaf latte)
and did some English proofreading and fooled around on the internet until it was the usual time for me to go home.

So technically, I've lied to my husband. Oh what a tangled web we weave. At least it was a cheap web (500 yen for the T-shirt, 380 yen for the Starbucks sakura latte).

(And it was good.)

Bare minimum requirement

Hitsuyou saiteigen



The week's make-ahead is six dishes, and one of them is steamed broccoli...I also have my usual soy eggs and shredded carrot salad. The one on the bottom left is ground pork with ginger and mushrooms stir fried in sesame oil and soy sauce. I could add a little broth and tofu to it, or maybe put it on toast with cheese for a quick breakfast sandwich.

My mom has the flu. She didn't want to go to the doctor's, which I get and would have respected if I hadn't been so sure it was the flu and I was afraid of my dad getting it. Managed to convince her let me take her to the local clinic open Saturday afternoons and have the test done and get the Relenza inhaler. The pharmacist was super nice and counseled her on how to do it and asked if she wanted to do it right there, and she did. The whole process took about an hour and a half at the local clinic and pharmacy. Mom paid 20%.

You can pry universal health care from my cold, dead fingers.

It's bleeding!

Chi ga dete iru!
The Pumpkin Prince has outgrown his full function car seat and is ready to progress to a booster seat. On the other hand, my friend N's son is growing out of his infant size car seat and is ready for a regular car seat. She is also in the planning phase of building a new house. So I planned a nice little Sunday tea where N and her family could come check out our house for ideas (she was especially interested in our kitchen) and she could pick up the Pumpkin Prince's old car seat. N's two-year old is allergic to eggs and wheat flour, so I bought locally grown apples and grapes for him. N brought an assortment of items from her local pastry shop.
I was getting ready to make coffee when I heard a loud cry. And the Pumpkin Daddy yell, "he's bleeding!"
The Pumpkin Prince had fallen and cut his forehead and was bleeding like…like…I don't know, livestock?
Facial wounds are notorious for bleeding more than their size. Fortunately, N was a quick thinker and shoved the Pumpkin Daddy aside, grabbed a handful of Kleenex and pressed firmly on the cut. The bleeding stopped pretty quickly. We apologized to N and her family and asked them to go home (with the car seat, of course), and I took the Pumpkin Prince to the duty clinic, which was a dermatologist's.
(As I've previously mentioned, in most Japanese communities, there is a "duty doctor" who covers the entire city on Sundays and national holidays. Of course, the emergency department in large hospitals is open all day every day, but for small things like colds and cuts, you are supposed to go to the duty doctor.)
As it turned out, the dermatologist was of the cosmetic surgery kind (he was the former chief of reconstructive surgery in the biggest reconstructive surgery department in town). He stitched up the cut very quickly. That was 2 weeks ago, and there's hardly even a trace of a scar left.
So…we were lucky that N's head is screwed on straight (much straighter than mine or the Pumpkin Daddy's) and the duty clinic doctor was so skillful. So we got treated by a plastic surgeon on a Sunday for free (medical care for children under 15 is free in this city.) Another episode that makes me thankful for Japanese medical care…(your milage may vary according to your age, location, nationality and ailment…)

(She) doesn't miss much!

Yoku mite iru!
I have conjunctivitis. Viral, bacterial or allergic, I am not sure (and neither is the ophthalmologist I saw this morning. And while Japanese medical care does have its drawbacks, I am not going to complain about how I woke up on a Sunday morning with an eye puffed out so badly and stuck together so tightly it could not be opened without using my fingers, and was seen by an ophthalmologist, prescribed medication, and left the pharmacy with said medication in my hand by 11 a.m. the same morning, and only about 4000 yen, or $50, poorer for my trouble). This morning, I could not get my left eye open without using my fingers. It's slightly better now, after 2 doses of oral antibiotics and eye drops, but not much. I'll figure out what to do next after a good night's sleep. In the meantime, I will not let this get me down. Actually, it is getting me down, but it won't take me down without a fight. Or something. Anyway, I'm going to be bright and cheerful and upbeat for my internet friends, imaginary or otherwise.

We went to the 2 local malls to see the Pumpkin Princess's Mothers' Day pictures.

You may recall this image from last year.



I am still not sure what the pink circle over my head is. I have received suggestions that it is a halo. The artist said it was my ponytail holder.

This year, we have this

and this.

Can you see I'm wearing glasses in both pictures? And can you make out the necklace with white flowers on it the Pumpkin Daddy got me for White Day in the bottom picture?

In (somewhat) quake related news (of course you knew I had to say something about the quake in this post), the Pumpkin Family planted bitter melon in containers

and the Pumpkin Daddy hung gardening net in front of the patio door. The idea is to get the plants to grow in front of the patio door, creating a green curtain that will make shade in summer (and help us put a dent in the amount of electricity used by the AC). We made the choice of bitter melon because of its robust, large leaves (as opposed to something like morning glory) and its disease resistance (as opposed to something like cucumber).

That's all 151 cm (4' 11" 1/2 or thereabouts) of me you see in the photo, so you can see how ambitious (and also potentially effective) this plan is.

There's only one container in the photo, but a couple days later, we added another one just like it on the left hand side of the patio.

Of course, the potential drawback is the possibility of a big bitter melon harvest. Anyone know any good bitter melon recipes (other than Okinawa-style stir fry with tofu and egg?)

For this, three wins, one loss (for now)

Kocchi ha (ima no tokoro) san shou ippai

H1N1 (aka swine flu) has struck the Pumpkin Clan, but so far, only the Pumpkin Princess has it, and even she is jumping around and asking for ice cream without the benefit of acetoaminophen (Tylenol to my American friends).

Sunday was pretty wild, though, since we headed to the Sunday duty clinic (in Pumpkin City, the city Physicians' Association designates a "duty clinic" where you go on Sundays. Clinics which belong to the association (OK, pretty much every single clinic in town) will see patients that Sunday. There are a couple internal medicine duty clinics, a GYN clinic, an ophthalmology clinic, an ENT clinic, and a pediatrics clinic designated as duty clinics each Sunday and National Holiday. For really serious stuff, you go to the Emergency Department (Ambulance Clinic to my Brit friends...I think) of a good-sized hospital, but some of the bigger hospitals (like the Red Cross Hospital and University Hospital) will fine you if you go in after hours for something mild like a splinter or a cold and tell you to go to the duty clinic next time if you don't like the fine, which is something like 7000 yen, or $80 depending on the exchange rate).

So Sunday morning, a whiny Pumpkin Princes crawled into the Pumpkin Mommy and Daddy's bed, and Daddy said to Mommy, "she's hot!" Mommy went downstairs to get the thermometer and confirmed that she did indeed have a fever. She took the Princess to the Duty Clinic (which was, fortunately, only a 5 minute drive from the Pumpkin Palace) and was told there was an hour wait, so as soon as the receptionist took copies of the health insurance card and the Pumpkin City medical care card, they went home and had a snack of Pretz and milk.

The tired looking pediatrician, who was a woman slightly younger than the Pumpkin Granny, took a nasal secretion sample (and gave the Pumpkin Princess a mild nosebleed in the process) and declared her positive for type A influenza, which, this early in the season, translates into "I'm pretty sure it's swine flu". She wrote a prescription for Tamiflu and Tylenol. We were told to wait in the car, and the pharmacist from the pharmacy conveniently (heh) located right next to the clinic brought the medications to us, we paid our 50 yen (for the container, the meds are paid for by health insurance and Pumpkin City because she's a child). We drove home, took the first of the Tamiflu and Tylenol, and the Pumpkin Princess went to bed.

Later that day, an unhappy Pumpkin Prince was discovered to have a temp of 38 degrees (100 or thereabouts). Pumpkin Mommy called the clinic and asked what the wait time was and was told it was an hour and a half. So she went alone, got checked in, went back home, waited around for about an hour, and went back with the Pumpkin Prince. The only problem was, the Pumpkin Prince was energetic and happy and smiling at all the harried looking parents in the waiting area who had brought their feverish kids too weak to move. We waited for about an hour (in addition to the time spent at home) to be told by the same pediatrician, who looked even more tired than she did that morning (I think she must have seen no fewer than 200 kids that day) that he looked way to happy to have influenza, took a nasal secretion sample at my asking, and declared him negative for type A flu.

I think we should have told the receptionist we were going home when he started smiling and making happy gurgling sounds at the sick looking 7 year-old girl who was carried in to the exam room by her dad.

Anyway...Monday, I took the day off work and took the Pumpkin Princess to her usual pediatrician. By then, she was fever free and chowing down custard pudding and strawberry ice cream like no one's business. However, the city day care system requires that once you are diagnosed with influenza A, you can't come to day care until you are fever free and have finished the required 5 day regimen of Tamiflu.

Tuesday morning, the Pumpkin Daddy announced he felt feverish and a bit achey, but so far hasn't been able to break the 37.5 degree mark (99 or thereabouts). The Pumpkin Prince measured in at 37.5, so we kept him home, and I stayed home as well (and cancelled a Wednesday work meeting just in case) but has been smiling and gurgling and crawling after the Pumpkin Princess (who is jumping off the sofa as she watches Cinderella II on DVD). I feel fine except for a runny nose I've had since early last week.

So swine flu vs. Pumpkin Palace is 1 to 3 so far. Here's to hoping it stays that way.

Isn't that overkill?

Yarisugi janai?

The Pumpkin Princess has the chicken pox. I regret that I didn't get her vaccinated. It's not required here, but it's safe and effective, and I really should have, but I procrastinated, and now it's too late. I took her to the pediatrician's a couple days ago. The clinic has a separate waiting room with a separate entrance for the kids with infections like chicken pox, measles, mumps, influenza, etc. We had the room all to ourselves, and there was a generous supply of toys and picture books. We kept each other entertained until the pediatrician (a woman about 10 years my senior and about my size and shape, when I'm not preggers anyway) came into the room with the nurse, examined her, pronounced my diagnosis of chicken pox correct, prescribed her some drugs, and left. The nurse came back with the drugs, explained them to me (this one is taken four times a day, at least four hours apart, this one you dab on the splotches with a Q tip, this one is in case she gets a fever, you can save them for later if she doesn't need them). I looked at the drug names, and found the oral med was acyclovir, an antiviral drug. I didn't know they give you antiviral drugs for chicken pox. I compared notes with my co-workers later that day, and they said that they got acyclovir for their kids when they got chicken pox, too. Seems to be standard procedure in Japan. It doesn't change the (already low) complication rate, but it shortens the course of the disease. They don't give it in the US, which I can understand. It strikes me as kind of being overkill. Still, I gave it to her, since it's a pretty safe drug and it's standard procedure here. 3 days later, most of the splotches have crusted and she is no longer getting new ones. We've had minimal tears about itching and lesions in the mouth. She's not had any fevers. Plus, the drugs and the exam were free. Who am I to complain?

Health care for children is free in Japan. How long depends on where you pay taxes. In Pumpkin City, you get free health care up until you start 1st grade. (If you want to get technical, the health insurance from my work pays for 70%, and Pumpkin City pays for the remaining 30%). I flash this card and I'm good. For Thursday's exam and the drugs, I paid 50 yen (60 cents or so?) for the container the topical Q-tip drug came in.

The system is not perfect. The premise is that you have regular health insurance. Most people do, but a small minority of low income households do not, and they won't pay the 30% if no one will pay the 70%. Also, the length of the coverage depends on the city. Pumpkin City is about 6 years, but the neighboring city will only pay for kids up to the age of 3. In Pumpkin City, they were kicking around the idea of paying until age 12, but with the economic downturn (and decreased tax revenue) of recent months, that one might go down the drain. We'll see.

It's about average in size.

Futsuu no ookisa desune.

In Japan, OBs do a lot more ultrasounds than their American counterparts. To estimate fetal weight, they measure head circumference, torso circumference, and femur (thigh bone) length on the ultrasound, and the machine will do some complicated math, and come up with a number. The Pumpkin Prince's current number is 1303 grams (slightly less than 3 pounds) which is about average for a Japanese fetus in its 30th week. I've been told throughout this pregnancy that he is average in size.

So this would be good news, except for one thing. When I was pregnant with the Pumpkin Princess, I was told throughout the pregnancy that she was "a little small, but her mommy is a little small, so that's expected." Then I gave birth and they put this fat baby with multiple fat lines in her elbows and knees and fine chubby cheeks that weighed almost 3200 grams (seven pounds) in my arms. I would have asked if it were really my baby, but she looked too much like me for me to doubt this. So if I am told throughout the pregnancy that the baby is normal in size, am I going to give birth to a humongous toddler sized boy?

How?

Douyatte?

Today was the Pumpkin Princess's 3 year-old physical, run by Pumpkin City. They asked that you bring in a urine sample. I went in with my empty ziplock bag and said that I hadn't been able to get a sample. The lady at the desk smiled and said I could bring it in any Thursday afternoon I managed to succeed.

Someone needs to explain to me how I am supposed to get a urine sample from a 3 year-old who refuses to use the toilet.

(Actually, I can think of at least two ways how it could be done, and I think I would be willing to try at least one of them if I were given the appropriate tools. I'm wondering how the average parent is expected to go about doing this, because a non-potty trained 3 year-old is not the least bit unusual.)