One of the dangers of being dern near 32 years old and not having had a physical since the dude in your highschool locker room made you turn your head and cough is that, after you make the appointment at an actual doctor's office, you have no idea what to do before you get there or what to expect once you arrive. Turns out, people assume that if you're over thirty, there's no possible way that this could be your first trip to the rodeo, and so, you're told nothing when you make the appointment.
There were no surprises upon arrival. I went to the desk, checked in, answered a myriad of seemingly random questions, sat down, stared at aquarium fish, and waited for them to call my name. The wait was short; a few minutes at most. A nurse called me back, weighed me (I lost a couple pounds!), took my temperature, checked my blood pressure, and asked me a bunch more questions. They were mostly about my alcohol consumption and my dad's heart history, which, seeing as my dad has had a couple heart attacks and is only 60 years old, raised a red flag. Oh, and one more question:
Nurse: "When did you eat last?"
Me: "Last night at around 11:00." (So it had been over twelve hours.) "But I did drink some coffee this morning."
Nurse: "Any cream or sugar."
Me: "Nope."
*note: Notice how they asked me nothing about when the last time I consumed alcohol was?
So yeah, the nursed finished up and the NP came in to complete my tune-up. Or so I thought. She looked in my ears and mouth, listened to my breathing, laid me down, and poked my belly in various places to see if there was pain. There was no pain, but there was some definite tickling. Not the good kind, though… that came later. This just really tickled and it took every ounce of self control I could muster to keep my composure and to keep from wriggling, writhing, and giggling underneath her probing hands. Then came the awkward part:
NP: "Do you want me to check your testicles."
Me: "Uhhh………..sure?"
NP: "OK. Hop down here and pull your pants down to your knees."
Me: "OK."
So I hopped down, dropped my drawers, and wished I hadn't still been cold from being outside. Regardless, she went to work.
NP: "I'm just gonna roll your testicles between my thumbs and fingers and check for any lumps, bumps, or irregularities. This, just like mammograms, should be done every year."
With that, she was done. It took all of about thirty seconds before she snapped off her latex gloves and deposited them in the trash. Mostly I was just glad that she hadn’t felt the need to drop them in the hazardous materials bin. I was also extremely relieved that I did not, during the course of the exam, get an erection.
Once I got my pants back up, The NP asked me a couple more questions, assured me that everything looked good, told me that the nurse would be in to give me a tetanus shot that I hadn’t asked for, shook my hand, and abruptly left. Moments later the nurse popped in, swabbed my arm, gave me my shot, informed me that I could go to the lab now, and abruptly left.
So there I was. I had a known destination but no idea how to get there, no idea what was gonna happen there, and no escort to get me there. I was completely on my own. So, instead of standing there like a mouth-breathing idiot, I wandered around looking for signs that might lead me to the right place. After what was probably only a minute or so (though it felt like 5) of wandering, a thin red-headed woman with a thick eastern European accent, standing stock still in front of a room I had already walked past, asked me rather icily if I was Eric. I said "Yup." She led me into the lab, had me take my jacket off, and indicated a chair with an elongated armrest for me to sit in.
Phlebotomist: (Icily in her thick accent) "Put out your arm and pull up your sleeve."
Me: "OK. Why?"
Phlebotomist: "So I can take blood."
Me: "OK. Why? Nobody said anything to me about this and I have no idea what I'm doing here."
Phlebotomist: "Oh. I'm going to take blood so we can check your cholesterol."
Ok, ok, so I was pretty sure that that was indeed what was happening. But I still felt, if for no other reason than to express a little displeasure at the lack of communication, that I should ask. About two minutes and 2 cc's of blood later, after being told I would receive my results by mail in about five days, I was putting my jacket back on and trying to find my way, on my own again, with no direction given…again, back to the lobby so I could get the hell out of there.
*Tune in next week for the next exciting installment of: Explosions of the Heart*
The post Explosions of the Heart, Part 1 appeared first on How to Get Rid of Things™.
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