just a virus (the story of my life!)

We hied ourselves to a local clinic today which apparently, even moreso than nice coffee houses and brunch places, was THE place to be this morning, as they had a three-hour wait. When the bored receptionist told me this I actually stared at her in disbelief, unable to speak. Wait three hours? With a toddler? I have a reasonably patient toddler, but that still means his limit for waiting is 20 minutes on a Very Good Day.

So we got ourselves on the bus and went to another clinic -- one which is closer to our house, but at which once I got admonished by a doctor for not seeing my family doctor instead (thanks, but she's hard to get an appointment with, and this was a minor matter, and you know? I really don't need that, thank you!) and so I try to avoid them. But we had a nice doctor who had a look and listen to my child, who of course despite his cough looks extremely well and is energetic and engaging and I felt almost silly for bringing him in. 

And after all that, she said -- well, sounds like it's just a virus. Not allergies, not asthma, just a prolonged cough. There's not much we can do, and in fact the cough is probably a good thing, as it's getting things out of his lungs. And by the way his respiratory rate last night wasn't as bad as we thought. It was high, but not dangerously high and within normal ranges for a toddler (not, perhaps, a sleeping and relaxed toddler, but perhaps a toddler with a congestion and slight fever). 

Always nice to hear that we could have all just gone back to bed within 30 minutes last night instead of staying up for two hours and being rather tired today.

But of course, always as ever a relief to know that it is, as ever, just a plain old virus.