Traveling with kids

Parenting breeds vulnerability. The more you love, the more you have to lose. So, as a parent of two small amazing children, trust me when I say that I feel vulnerable. Traveling as a family for a month means that you are without a few things: 1.) Your bed (or crib), 2.) Your daily routine, and 3.) Your “people,” meaning your doctors, babysitters, friends – your support group. You may also be without your sanity or sleep, OBVIOUSLY. That’s not to say that you shouldn’t travel, it keeps us young, interesting, cultured and most importantly socially and emotionally flexible. It’s important to shake up your element, but being out of it is also daunting and harrowing on those sleepless nights. So anything that makes traveling with kids feel more secure, and less vulnerable, is a very good thing indeed.

Which brings me to the reason for this post during this traveling season – to you remind you about the ease and usefulness of the Doctor On Demand app, so you have one less thing to worry about while traveling. Yes, they are sponsoring this post, but I’m so happy to say that it is an app that we have come to rely on consistently for our family (and no, I don’t get the service for free).

Back to the setup. We were in New York for work these last couple of weeks (it’s been insane work-wise – I’ll fill you in on that later). The whole family came, including Sylvia (our nanny) so that Brian and I could work during the day, and the kids would have someone familiar to be with. AND, so that we could go out to dinner, and even see the musical Hamilton . . . WHICH IS THE BEST LIVE THING YOU’LL EVER WITNESS, AND IT WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE.

During the two weeks there we did have an unfortunate incident that had to do with a chin on a marble floor. And no, I didn’t manufacture such an incident because we were doing this post, but yes I was extremely happy to be able to use the service once again.

We were eating dinner, I was grabbing Charlie more milk (whilst probably trying to convince him that dinner is just a really big snack – that kid is obsessed with SNACKS), when he stood up on the dining chair in our rental apartment and flipped over the back of it, landing on the marble floor. It was a hard hit, and probably the first fall that made me actually worried that we would need to go to the emergency room. It split his chin open and was bleeding pretty badly, and he was freaking out pretty hard. Brian wasn’t there which SUCKED. Long story short the gash was big enough that I knew stitches were in the realm of possibility. But going to the emergency room to get stitches on a wiggly 2 year old isn’t exactly a walk in Central Park, especially when its 8pm and you have a baby there as well. So we did what we have done now 5 times – used the Doctor On Demand service.

Brian came home and neither of us wanted to take our kids to the emergency room. We knew that Charlie was fine because he started eating and begging to watch Bubble Guppies which we happily allowed. But we wanted someone to calm us down, to tell us that we weren’t irresponsible parents if we didn’t take our child to the ER and put our family through however-many-hours of terribleness.

We jumped online and this time we chose the

“right now” option instead of scheduling an appointment for a few hours ahead. Our doctor popped up in the app, asked us all the same questions an in-room physician would – how did it happen, what were the circumstances, how long ago, how badly did it bleed, etc. Then was the tricky part – getting Charlie to sit still long enough to let us look under his chin – as it wasn’t on the front of his face. The doctor said what I was hoping he’d say – that if it were his kid he wouldn’t take them in. That he might have a scar but that a 2 year old won’t sit still long enough to get really good clean stitches so it could scar anyway, and that the emergency room and stitches process is scarring in itself. He made sure that Charlie could move his jaw, etc (as that was what I was most worried about when I heard him fall), but since he had been eating and showed no signs of pain, he was diagnosed as having a bump and a cut, but nothing serious. Thank goodness.

If we hadn’t had that service as an option we would have gone to the emergency room out of paranoia and protectiveness. Brian wanted to, I didn’t, but of course I felt like a TERRIBLE parent for even suggesting that we not take him in. We were both so relieved to get the advice that we didn’t need to do it, but could if we were that worried about a scar (and we aren’t, since it’s not on the front of his face, although even if it were we all have scars, so what?).

I seriously can’t recommend the service enough, and yes they are paying for post but they certainly aren’t paying for every time that we’ve used it, or my gushing about it. I just love having it as professional resource.

Charlie has been rocking the bandaid around town. It’s healing just fine and I’m extremely glad that we didn’t put our family through the torture of a middle-of-the-night emergency room session. As a busy mom you want to make sure that you are properly caring for your kids, especially when they take a little tumble and you think a trip to the emergency room is in order. Luckily, Doctor On Demand physicians can diagnose, treat, and prescribe medications if needed for 17 of the top 20 conditions that are treated in urgent care or the ER. Both Brian and I get peace of mind and without a discussion where I feel like I’m being neglectful, and he feels like he’s overbearing.

Anyway, no matter what you pack in your 9 bags when traveling with kids, you can’t pack the confidence that nothing will happen to your kids while you are away from home. So, knowing that there is this resource isn’t something I constantly think about, but when we need them it’s just wonderful that they are there.

Happy Traveling this holiday season, folks. Hopefully you don’t get stuck at the airport at 12am (3am our time) with your two kids and frozen credit cards :) But, if in fact you are, our friends over at Doctor On Demand have passed along the code: EMILYHENDERSON to ease the pain (no pun intended) so that you can schedule your first video visit for free and give it a try.

***This post in partnership with Doctor On Demand, although all words, ideas and opinions are mine.

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