Holidailies: Do They know It's Christmas Time

"It's Christmastime; there's no need to be afraid..."

The EEG yesterday went as well as could be expected. We tried to prepare Julia for the 45 minutes of sitting around with a hat full of electrodes by telling her that she was going to have to wear a hat for the doctor. Her bedtime wish that night was that the hat she had to wear would be a cowboy hat. So I brought the cowboy hat she refused to wear on Halloween, hid it beneath my coat and gave it to the receptionist to put in the examining room.

She was tired, the seizures seem to have drained her a lot. She complained of aches and pains, as though her body had done a myriad of brutal exercises, which I guess it had. She was whiny and complainy but since the tech had wheeled a TV with Dora epsiode on it, she sat pretty well. I sat there on the bed that she decided was more comfortable than the chair that was first offered and we snuggled as best we could under the circumstances. She watched Dora and I watched the face of the tech who stared at the computer screen hooked up to my child's brain. Her face, of course, was inscrutiable and I had to content myself with wild imaginings and worst case scenarios. It might not come as a shock to you that I am prone to letting my imagination get the best of me.

After the minutes ticked by and she told us that we were done, she left the room to fetch a much deserved Dora sticker for Julia. I snuck a peek at the computer screen. Wouldnt you? Even if all I saw were meaningless squiggles of brain wave activity, at least I was able to see something, right? The quick glance was supposed to assuage my wild imaginings but what it did instead was boost the fodder with which I could imagine my scenarios.

On the screen was a series of black brain wave lines. A whole screen of identical squiggles that seemed harmless and, dare I say it? Normal. Except. One. Down at the bottom of the screen there was one lonely red line. So starkly red against the normal black waves that dominated the rest of the screen that I was alarmed. Beneath part of the red wave there was a line measuring..something. And perhaps it was noral too, but in my little bubble world, things outlined in red and measured when other parts of the screen are not, doesnt bode well. Maybe its the English teacher in me but when I circle things in red, it means something is amiss, out of place.

But Julia ws just glad to be done. She slapped the cowboy hat on top of her greasy electrode-conducting-gel-covered hair, snapped up the Dora sticker and skipped out of the office. Ah the forgiveness of youth unburdened with wild imaginings. So my Christmas gift to myself is the attempt at normalcy. For her to have joy unfettered at Christmas time is what she will remember this holiday season.

"Here's to you, raise a glass for ev'ryone
Here's to them, underneath that burning sun"