Are "Well Visits" Making us Sick???

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On Wednesday the boys had an appointment with a pediatric opthomalogist to have their eyes checked.  I've braved many double doctors appointments alone and although I knew the boys would likely get the dialating drops and we'd have to wait a half hour for them to kick in, I braved this one alone too.  I came armed with a stack of the boys favorite books, a half a ream of computer paper and two pens (which have been known to entertain our kids for hours at a time), and a few trains.  But I wasn't prepared for what happened.  When the tech called us back, she walked us through a winding maze of hallways and exam rooms back to the pediatric waiting room (translation- a waiting room for young children)- where there was a giant television blaring.  I tried to engage the boys with their paper and pens, but of course they were instantly glued to the novel new television show on the screen.  Phineas and Ferb.  Our boys have never seen Phineas and Ferb.  They have never seen anything remotely like Phineas and Ferb.  They have never seen anything other than Sesame Street, Curious George, and Thomas and Friends.  Yet in that waiting room, the waiting room in the doctors office (a pediatric doctors office mind you), my boys got to watch their first violent television show.  I anxiously looked around to find another place for us to wait, but we were surrounded by exam rooms and the adult waiting room was 3 hallways away.  I didn't want to miss being called for our appointment so we had to stay put.  There was no remote and there were 4 other young kids also glued to the TV, so I felt too self-conscious to get up and figure out how to change the channel.  I wish I had had the courage, because sadly the boys were no longer interested in their paper, books, or trains.  Instead we watched Phineas and Ferb.  We watched it intently.   And I could feel my heart breaking.  In that 15 minutes we waited, my boys learned how to hit, push, shove, throw things at peoples heads, scream at people in an awful nasty voice, give wedgies (which we actually tried out right there in the waiting room by rolling around on the floor trying to pull at each others underwear) and to call people nerds.  All things we have worked so hard to make sure they were never exposed to.  After we returned from the pre-exam and getting the dilating drops, I stuck my iPad directly in front of the boys faces with a Thomas video blasting just to keep them distracted from the next episode of Phineas and Ferb.

Luckily the eye exam went well.  The boys are slightly farsighted but still within the normal limits- just something we'll recheck in a year.  But I am still painfully bothered by the television in the waiting room.  And here is why.  Doctors are supposed to help us raise healthy children.  We turn to them as experts- for both knowledge and support- to help with this unbelievably difficult task of parenting.  In their first three years of life, our boys have visited our pediatrician for over a dozen "well" visits to ensure their health.  We have given them over a dozen vaccinations, albeit delayed a bit, to ensure their health.  We have worked tirelessly to limit exposure to television, junk food, and environmental toxins.  We have endured our friends and family mercilessly making fun of us for not allowing the boys to gorge themselves on sweets and processed foods.  We make sure they get plenty of exercise and enough sleep- the latter for which we have also been highly criticized.  Yet every time we go to the pediatricians office we plop our boys in front of a television blaring inappropriately violent cartoons and when they are done with the appointment the nurse tries to shove a sugary lollipop in their faces.  We politely request a sticker.

Is it just me or does anyone else find this disturbing?  Sadly I'm afraid this is yet another topic that makes me feel so different- because no one else really seems to mind that the very people who we rely on to keep our children healthy are sending us the exact opposite messages.  Yes- I understand why pediatricians offices have big screen televisions and doctors have lab coat pockets full of lollipops.  It is easier for everyone involved to have the 15 kids in the waiting room quietly glued to a television screen instead of running around doing what kids are supposed to be doing- being active and noisy.  And I understand that it is in the best interest of everyone within a half mile radius to stick a piece of candy in the mouth of a screaming toddler immediately after you've given him three shots.  It's easy.  But parenting shouldn't be easy.  And if you think it should be, you have no business being a parent.  Being a parent should be the hardest thing you will ever do in your life.  You are responsible for raising another human being to be a productive member of society.  And exactly one week after 26 innocent people were gunned down in an elementary school- this should be more important than ever and on the top of everyone's mind.  Raising children is not easy.  So why is it that our doctors, the ones we rely on to help us with this monumental task, are sending us the message that it's okay to take the easy road- even when it contradicts the very things they are going to tell us in that exam room? 

Just some food for thought during a time when the world is searching for answers to the deepest darkest questions we can ask ourselves as human beings.  I think the answers aren't simple or on the surface, but deeper and possibly rooted in the basic motions of our everyday lives.  But I'm afraid we are too vain and intertwined with the conveneince of such things to step back and take a serious look at them. I, for one, will be waiting with my children in the hallway where we will be reading books and drawing while we wait for our doctors appointments.  The nurse can walk a few extra steps to find us.  It'll be good exercise for her.