A New Doctor

After school I had a visit to a new doctor. I had been putting off the visit to this doctor for a long time, until I found a suitable candidate to explore my last unexplored, and/or unexploited orifices.

This was not an easy task. The most poop-u-lar gastroenterologist in town lives down the street from me. Dr. Steckman. Now what kind of a name is that for a doctor who explores one's gastric regions? I AM THE STECK MAN. I AM THE WALRUS. GOO GOO CA G'JOOB. GOO GOO my ass. NOT MY NEIGHBOR.

Can you imagine, your neighbor doing YOUR colonoscopy? Running into him on the street or at the local deli? Oh hi Dr. Steckman, how IS the chocolate pudding here?

I have been having some stomach issues for a year now. I am also over 50. So I knew that I had it coming...the exploration of both regions. The question was WHO?

My doc (who is a woman, as are most of my physicians thank you - save for the crazy woman dermatologist who traumatized me by having a man come in and look at my very unusual issue who happened to be a young MALE doctor WHOM I KNEW - but that is for another story...) referred me to a woman doctor whom she had heard about, whose name I cannot spell nor pronounce. El Shaheed or something like that. Fine. I don't care where she is from as long as she is a woman.

I go to the office, and get a sheath of paperwork to fill out. Like a good student, I arrive in plenty of time to fill out my medical history. 10 minutes or so fly by, and I am interrupted by the nurse. "Ms. Gibbons?" "Already" I ask?
"I am not finished with my medical history, it is quite..um..copious" I reply. She takes it, incomplete, and I am frantic that I might have left off the bout of girardia I contracted while traveling, or some piece of pertinant information.

What I did not take into account is, that as you get older, you need more than the standard 15 minutes to fill out your medical history. It is just tooo long.

I enter the exam room and sit staring at the plastic models of the stomach, intestines, and colons. I want to touch them and see if I can take them apart and put them back together. As I am about to reach for one, she comes in, this doctor who is pretty and is like a breath of fresh air. Young, smartly dressed, and above all, kind.

I spill my guts (no pun intended) to her, and she takes her notes. As I feared, an endoscopy is to be performed in the near future. She also wants to do the C thing, but that is for another time. I tell her I have a medical phobia, and is it ok to self medicate (prescription wise) before I come for it. She assures me it will be ok, someone will find my one and only vein that is big enough to stick a pediatric needle in, to inject the magic sleep fluid.

I consent to this, and almost too easily I make an appointment with the next person, who instantly recognizes me as her son's art teacher. We talk and I mumble something that school has finally got the best of me - or my stomach.

The date is set. The first day of spring. What a way to usher in a new season.
I am told I will be a bit woozy from the drugs. As long as I don't know OR feel a thing. And hopefully, nothing will be wrong save for a over vigilant acid valve or something like that, and diet modification and/or a little pill will take care of it all. Then I can move on to the next medical adventure. And what a blog THAT will be.

Patti O Examination