Ears to You!

So, we’re back from Kauai and actually in much better shape than I expected. Traveling anywhere with an 18-month old can be taxing. And traveling with an 18-month old to Hawaii and back is asking for trouble.

It turns out that toddlers don’t really understand much about noise and the proximity of other passengers on an airliner. They don’t get the idea that staying seated for five and a half hours is expected. And they certainly haven’t figured out that it’s much better to try and sleep on such a long flight than it is to fight it.

But, that being said, I will take the fussiness and frustration of being trapped in the seat of a 757 over the pain that comes with ear problems at 30,000 feet. And I speak from experience.

The last time I made the trip to Hawaii, I was 19. It was the summer after my freshman year in college and my folks took me and my sister to Oahu and Maui. The day before we returned home, I developed a bit of swimmer’s ear. And that, combined with genetically weak sinuses created a pain cocktail that I have yet to feel again. I’ve had some back pain, but nothing is worse than an earache in both ears over the Pacific.

My mom told me she thought it was God getting back at me for not being able to experience the pain of birth. I didn’t think it was fair he was making me have twins. By the time we landed, both my ears were shot and I was out of it for several days and pretty much deaf for a week.

This explains why I’m a little bit shaky when it comes to taking Finley on planes. I just hope she inherited her mother’s ears and not mine. And halfway through our vacation, we were beginning to think she not only had my ears, but would get to follow Dad’s footsteps for ear problems on the way home.

A couple of times during our stay in the south part of Kauai, Finley had woken up in the middle of the night, crying. As many parents know, this is a fairly normal occurrence. But when we would go in to check on her, she would be tugging on her ear lobe. I knew that it was one of two things… She was either impersonating Carol Burnett or she had water in her ear. More than likely it was the latter.

Now I know from personal experience (again) that just because you have water in your ear, that doesn’t man your ear is infected. Not yet, anyway. Sometimes it just feels clogged, like a wad of cotton that won’t fall out. And sometimes it itches. I was just hoping this was what was keeping her up and not the beginnings of inflammation.

So, after the second day of ear tugging, Heather encouraged – prodded – me to search for a local pediatrician. And after a few phone calls and confirmation that they would, indeed, be able to bill to our medical insurance, we found a family practitioner at a clinic up the road.  After a short drive off the main road and down a dirt driveway, we found ourselves checking into a large hut in the town of Koloa. As remote as this seemed, I had a hunch this guy would be just the ticket. I mean, of all the doctors we could find, this is the one guy who works in a sleepy surfer town and has probably seen his share of ear infections. I figure he probably makes his living off of setting broken bones and selling ear drops to the local and tourist surfers. And I was pretty much right.

For a $15 co-pay, Dr. Murray was able to take a quick peek and assure us that Finley’s ears were fine. He suggested a little Tylenol at night, but that he could see no reason for us to worry about the flight back.

Which brings me to about three hours in to our flight back to Seattle. Finley has just settled down and with the help of a portable DVD player and the Wiggles is about to fall asleep. Heather and I are both tired from vacation and struggling to help Finley find peace on the plane. But if the worst of our troubles is a toddler trying to escape from an airline seat, then we’re in for a happy landing every time.