Remember the first time your mother/ father guided you into the doctor’s office? You were nervous in the waiting room, where the smell of hand sanitizer wafted into your nostrils and the cries of children, like yourself, wafted into your ears. You didn’t know about the alcohol swab or the needle or the ensuing lollipop.

Gosh, you were so naive. You didn’t know that a flu shot was supposed to help you, that the doctor was playing the good guy. You felt like the victim in some sick adult horror movie. You often wondered: “Why on earth are they taking a cup of my pee?” And, with horror, you often wondered: “Why are they taking my blood?”

You let your imagination run wild. We all thought that doctors were vampires in disguise; that doctors were part of an elaborate plot to collect blood (or was that just me?).

This is my perspective as a child at the doctor’s office (this picture is originally from Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau’s 1929 classic horror film, Nosferatu).

Now you’re the parent. And now, you’re guiding your kid into the same place that threatened the security of your bowels when you were a kid. You feel the guilt swell up inside you as you watch your kid cry, as the giant mosquito- like needle drinks its fill.

There are numerous things we can do to comfort our children. Honesty, for one, goes a very long way. Let your kid know that it’ll hurt, but always remain positive and reassuring. Behavioral scientist have explained that children have a tendency to mimic their parents. If you show up in the clinic with an anxious demeanor, with beads of sweat rolling down the side of your face, you might want to reevaluate yourself.

Children deal with fear and anxiety in such complex ways. Bringing a stuffed animal to the clinic and encouraging imaginary friends might not be such a bad idea. This way, the child learns to cope with pain using his/ her own imagination. A strong imagination, in my opinion, is just as important as a healthy diet (this illustration is by the legendary Bill Watterson, who is the hand behind the cartoon series, Calvin and Hobbes).

If you’re calm and smiling, your child will follow suit. There’s no way around the pain, but there are things you can do to make sure that your child is comfortable (like being there every step of the way with a warm embrace). Children don’t understand the medicinal value of a flu shot or a blood test, so they’ll let their imaginations run loose (we’ve all been there). As parents, it’s up to us to be there, ready to engage a hug or a kiss. Those things fall under the primary role of parents: to protect/ nurture. And mental health is just as important as physical health, so it’s important that your kid knows that the doctor isn’t involved in a vampire conspiracy.