Today was my daughter’s two year well baby check up and it went fine. She’s meeting all her milestones and doing really good. She got her flu shot and she did really good with that too. Then came the “oh by the way, she needs to go to the lab so they can do a blood draw.” Okay, I forgot they do lead testing every so often. So we go down, and it’s crowded per usual, no big deal. We go back to the lab and they do the usual prep to draw blood, but they’re having trouble finding a vein. They find one finally and stick the needle in her arm and then they lose the damn vein!! This nurse is digging in my daughter’s arm for like five minutes before going onto the next arm. My daughter is red and screaming, and she’s sobbing and holding onto me tightly. It’s breaking my heart and I feel so helpless. They bruise her other arm, and still can’t get a vein. I didn’t let them dig around in her arm. We have to go back on Thursday and I’m dreading it. The nurses were apologetic about it, but I was dazed and felt sick for my baby. I wasn’t angry at them, not outwardly anyway. It’s now 2 in the morning and its still bothering me. I feel terrible, like I let this happen to her. ***Where we live, it is standard for them to do a blood draw for lead. My younger brothers also had it done when they were little. I do think it’s stupid though, because WIC does the finger prick and also tests for lead, but the hospital says they need a separate more thorough one “for their records.” I’m not sure if anything bad would happen if I refused the hospital’s test but I kind of want to, her arms are bruised and painful today.