Check In

I take in medication while the director and another do a lice check. They always start by asking the kids questions like, "How are you feeling? Are you healthy?" An especially honest girl told us that her mom wears a headband to cover her thinning hair, and, about herself and how she's feeling: "I'm thick. I mean, some girls are skinny and everything, but I have some more meat on me." We all stared at her in awkward silence (really, I've seen children a lot larger than she!) before we started blubbering about how she's healthy. Kids are awkward. 

I asked another kid if he had medication with him. "Nope," he replied, "Just an EpiPen and an inhaler." When I asked what he's allergic to, he said, "I don't know, ask my mom."

And about that same EpiPen, I had the following conversation with the kid's mom:

"What's he allergic to?"

"Everything."

"Okay...What was the EpiPen prescribed for?"

"I don't know, the doctor just wanted him to have it."

"So he doesn't have any severe allergies that you know of?"

"Well, he's allergic to basically everything, dogs, nuts, you name it."

"Okay...What kind of reaction does he have when exposed to dogs, nuts, etc.?"

And so on the conversation went. Parents, if your child has an EpiPen, PLEASE educate them on when/how to use it. 

Another family told me they packed two inhalers, so I asked them to pull one out for me to keep in the health center and another for the kid to carry around. They pulled out an Advair inhaler and an albuterol inhaler, and when I asked for one, they handed me the albuterol, saying he uses Advair "when he needs it." Again, please educate yourself and your child when it comes to medicine, particularly emergency medicine. 

And, something super sad: A girl was visibly distressed after check in, and the director said she's been coming for four years and he knows her well, so it certainly wasn't early homesickness setting in. No...Turned out she made some friends last year and they had all told her they were all coming back to camp this week. Apparently, in a cruel joke they played on her, they all came last week, leaving her to be stranded with a bunch of newbies this week. Girls can be evil. 

This week I'm down from 91 to 28 campers, no special needs, and medication is only distributed to a total of four kids after breakfast and after dinner.