Horrible!

Today I took my girl for her 8 week immunization shots and I have to say, it was one of the most horrible experiences of my life. It was a microcosm of the horrible push-pull of parenthood, where sometimes you have to hurt them because you love them, and they cannot possibly understand why. Here we were in the doctor's office and she'd been so good all day (as usual, really). She had on her bright pink sleeper and she was cooing and smiling with me while we waited, her little pink tongue darting in and out. She was great through all her little checks, weigh-in etc, but eventually she started to fuss and I knew she was hungry so I put her to the breast while the Dr. went to get the vials. She told me to hold her as I was and then proceeded to give her the first of four (yes, four!) big shots into her little pink legs - needless to say she screamed! She went from this lovely, happy little girl, trusting completely in her mother to this frightened, wailing purple ball of fire, fat tears dripping down her little cheeks, arms flailing every which way. She gasped and sobbed in a way that really showed how much it hurt her and it was so spontaneous, the way it made me cry too, I couldn't help it, it was like a reflex. It hurt me physically to hear that awful cry from my child as I held her in my arms for the other three shots, pressing my face against hers, hot with tears, hoping that the skin-to-skin would calm her. I pressed her naked belly against mine and rocked and whispered to her until she gradually calmed herself, pulling in short stabs of breath and little sobs until I could get her back nursing again. I rocked her and crooned and calmed myself down and when she was done nursing I lay her on the table to dress her again and she looked up into my face, her eyes full of trust again and smiled at me, full and wide and brilliant, as though it had never happened. I almost cried again to see how much this lovely little girl trusts me even though I brought her there and it confirmed for me once again that I would walk to the ends of the earth for her.