When your husband is your doctor

When we were support raising, someone asked us, “Aren’t you worried about taking your family to a place that does not have much good medical care?” Travis looked at them with a bit of a puzzled and even injured look as he had just completed 22 years of schooling/training to be a doctor.

In a place like Bundibugyo, I am glad that he is a doctor. Mostly, because our little family have been his primary patients. This week, we finished a bottle of Nu-Skin Skin Glue as Travis glued a deep gash in Patton’s chin closed (learning to ride without training wheels is hard in a rocky terrain!). And last week, the day after Travis had recovered from malaria, I came down with it (we do take malarial prophylaxis!). It was a really hard week, both from the sickness and from the side effects from the medicine. On Friday, I was feeling somewhat better as I had finished the malarial meds, so I was holding Aidan while I looked for his clothes in the wardrobe. When I closed the door, it hit my big toe and immediately I felt pain sear through my leg. The door had pulled up my toenail.

This is now the second time that Travis has saved the day as my doctor. The first was when he delivered Patton because he was born so fast that the midwife did not have time to arrive. The second was yesterday: the day he did a surgical procedure to remove my big toenail.

Which leaves me with two questions:

1. Do I get a discount if I get a pedicure?

2. Can I file an insurance claim and have Cigna pay my doctor? (That would help our support account!)

Meanwhile, I will be waiting 3-12 months to have a fully grown, hopefully not funky looking, big toenail. What a great way to keep me humble and my vanity in check as this is a sandals/flip flop only culture!