Concerns about Cory's Confidence

So, I took Cory to her 11-yr-old well-child. Yes, she's 11.5 and her birthday is in April, but since the old pediatrician's office was convinced that all insurance companies would only cover well-child visits if it was at least 12 months after the last one (which may have been true for our insurance, who knows) and since the same pediatrician's office was always booked into the next month or beyond, and also in part because maybe the mom in question (that would be me) wouldn't always be thinking eight weeks in advance for well-child visits and would be calling just before or after the anniversary of her last check-up, over a decade or so the physical got pushed later and later in the year. Then it got pushed back two extra weeks because after I arranged for Grandpa to come down on a Tuesday to watch the other kids so I could go and pick her up from school at 2:40 to make a 3:00 appointment which would get done in time to pick up Liam from jazz ensemble practice (his school is conveniently located close to the doctor's office) and have us home by 4ish, all very efficient, Cory called me while I stood in the parking lot waiting for her to come out of school to tell me she had forgotten I was picking her up and was on her bus heading home, oops. So, after a $50 no-show fee and a quick reschedule, we got Cory in on a Monday at 3pm--which is a kind of stinky day since my dad babysits my niece on Monday and everyone else in the world has to pick up their own kids from schools at that time, BUT at least G has an after school program so I would not have to worry about him getting off the bus while I took everyone else along to the doctor.

Then I did my once-monthly glance at Facebook and saw a friend list her status as "Trying to find childcare for a not-very-sick toddler so I can make a meeting tomorrow morning. He doesn't have a fever, but these germophobic days I might bother other moms taking a coughing kid in to preschool..." I figured that this could be either a plea for assurances that a coughing kid could go to preschool or a subtle fish for someone who might take her toddler during this meeting, and so I called to offer to watch the little one the next morning if Bot, Alex and Dunc could hang at their house while I took Cory to the doc's. It was a deal, especially since her husband was working from home that day and--he could go grab her kids from school while she let our boys hang out and play Legos. (Someone ELSE'S Legos are even BETTER than the regular kind!)

So, this is a long way of getting to the part about how I ended up in the pediatrician's office with just Cory, Timmy, and Kayleigh (on a Monday--which, stinky day as it is logistically it worked out pretty well and is totally irrelevant to the story.) All the doctors in this practice ask the same standard questions at well-child visits to check on the social/emotional well-being of the kids--since my kids only go to a physical once a year (or so) and we've only been with this practice for two years, they aren't so familiar with these questions (though one mom times six verbal-well-child's a year means *I* am very familiar with these questions) and so are either taken aback or take way too much time to answer accurately and thoroughly when the purpose could be served with a simpler, shorter answer. For example, when they ask, "How are you doing in school?" a simple, "Fine, my grades are good" would suffice, but Liam might answer, "Well, let's see, in Biology I'm doing fine, really fine! But I'm not doing so well in World History--I mean, I'm not failing, but I did miss a homework and so that pulled my grade below a 90 and so my mom won't let me watch TV or use my computer for games and stuff-- they have to let me use it at least somewhat because my school is laptop-based and I need to either email in my assignments or use the internet for research or use Edline to look up my assignments and grades--but they won't let me play games on my computer or watch TV until I get the grade back up to a 90 for the quarter, which will be easy since it's early in the quarter, y'know, so there aren't many grades yet so the 97 I just got on today's test will pull that way up easily, I just need my teacher to post it online so my parents can confirm it...So, that's Bio and World History, what's left? Um, Latin--"

"Well, that's OK, it sounds like you're doing fine as long as you remember your homework. What's your favorite subject?"

"Oh, my favorite? Hmm, well, that's kind of a toss up between geometry, religion, and biology. I'd have to really think about that, because actually I like World History a lot, too--"

"That's fine, you like more than one subject--great! Do you take part in activities at school, too?"

"Yeah, I do the jazz ensemble--only not many people are showing up for that and it would be really great if we could get a drummer to come consistently--and Ultimate, though that's not through school because we don't HAVE an Ultimate Frisbee team at my school, but I'm hoping to start one in the spring. I play with the team in South Orange, you know, Columbia High School? Then I have Boy Scouts, though that's ALSO not through school, that's in my town, and I still do origami--I was probably doing that last year when I had my last physical, too--"

"Good, you seem to be very well-rounded! And you have a good group of friends?" At this point I could see that she's shifted to a more yes-no slant to her questions in the hopes that Liam would give a short answer, so when he takes a deep breath and starts to explain about his school friends, his West Orange friends, his friends who are not from West Orange OR school, etc I finally have pity on the woman and simply say, "Liam, she just wants to know if you have friends, not who they all are."

"OH! Yeah, uh, I have friends." And so on.

#

Cory was a bit more astute at getting the purpose of the questions, but she had me in stitches anyway--only unlike Liam, she set out to entertain. She was all ham that day. It started innocently enough.

"What school do you go to?"

"Aquinas Academy--see?" as she points to the name on her gym sweats.

"Oh, that's in Livingston, right? Do you like it there?"

"Oh yeah, I love it there! It's great." Little shrug, merely a statement of fact.

"Good! And do you have a favorite subject?"

An almost airy, "Eh. I like them all, I guess."

"And how are your grades? You're doing OK?"

"Oh, yeah, yeah, they're all OK." Little wave of her hand to brush off such silly concerns.

"And are you in any activities?"

At this one Cory glanced over at me as I wiggled Timmy on to one leg while holding K on the other because I'd given a little snort. "She certainly IS!" I groaned. Cory grinned, and then looked at the politely perplexed doctor and said, "She has to drive me everywhere. I'm in basketball, and band, and I take piano, and I'm in the principal's council, and Student Council, and Girl Scouts, and Builder's Club--"

"What's that?"

"Oh, Builders Club? That's like a service organization in our school."

"Wow, so you're in a lot of things, and you're doing well in school, I'm guessing you have plenty of friends...?"

I answered, "Yes, she's fine there, too."

And Cory kind of waved her hand and shook her head as she declared matter-of-factly, "Oh, yeah, everyone likes me, I'm awesome."

Totally straight face--the doctor turned and looked at me, uncertain whether Cory was serious or joking or what.

"As you can see, self-esteem is not a problem with her." I gave a wry grin, and the doc grinned back, and then Cory decided to wrap up her act.

"Oh, YEAH, my self-esteem is GRRRREAT! NO problems there." She was able to hold the straight face for about five more seconds, and then finally broke into a smile that revealed that she knew just how much of a cocky little ham she was being.