randulo’s unblog

Shortly after I began working in a large air-conditioned computer room, I began having chronic eye problems. The basic condition was either a stye or something very close to it. I finally had to go have it cut out at a spoecialized clinic. Anyone who has had eye surgery knows the toe-curling sensation the mere idea conjures up, so it was with much trepidation that I showed up at the clinic. It turned out to be a quick procedure performed by a charming female specialist. This was followed by a few weeks of having a black eye, but it healed up just fine.
 
Unfortunately, the thing came back a few years later and I scheduled an operation at a different clinic. The date was far off, and when it finally arrived, the stye had shunk considerably and gave all appearances of going away by itself. I arrived at the clinic, but was unable to see a doctor before the operation. Even though it's a procedure that only involves the head, I was prepped for the operating room with a cap, gown and those little funny paper shoes that make you feel like a turkey dressed for the oven. Appropriate because this place was very, very hot. They had a huge crowd and I was parked on a gurney for literally three hours while cases of various seriousness were wheeled around the "lot". In the meantime my wife was wondering if I had died on the table. Finally I was brought in tot he block where the doctor took a look and said "Too small, I can't cut this out." and it was over, I got dressed and walked out without being touched by a scalpel or other surgical instrument.
 
During those three hours, every single person near me had conditions that were obviously horribly painful, life-threatening and certainly some were fatal. Maybe one of them even died that day. Spending three hours on your back waiting your turn for surgery is something that makes you give thanks daily for good health. It reminds me of the Frank Capra movie "It's a Wonderful Life" where the Jimmy Stewart character gets to see alternative versions of lives.
 
Two weeks later, that clinic was closed after an outbreak of Legionnaire's disease after a contaminated water system was found. It never reopened. Am I lucky, or what?

Is there anything more humbling in a man's life than to have to stand naked in a cold room with a female medical technician looking on (and why are they always young and adorable?) while you try to perform some biological act best done in private? I have been in this position several times in my life and I'd have expected it would get easier, but it does not. The first time, I was in an emergency room, getting a smear done. This wouldn't have been a big deal except that just at the critical moment, there was major commotion and the young woman said "Here, you hold it" and went out without pulling the curtain. I saw a man crying, holding a blue baby, explaining that it had fallen into the swimming pool. This was an awful brush with reality, to be standing there, pants down, holding "myself" while that scene was happening about 5 feet away. People who work in the ER see this stuff every day. No wonder they can watch you shivering naked and embarrassed and not bat an eye.
 
The next time I had to have such an exam, it was at the Pasteur Institute in Paris. The nurses there are nuns, not particularly young or cute. The unexpected part of this visit wasn't a young death next to my superficial problem, but something this nun said to me. She was telling me how to produce the sample on the slide, which she was holding. Again, I'm standing in front of this person with my ... in my hand following her instruction exactly. Then she said with a wry smile "Come on! You can do better than that!" Somehow this is probably the only admonishment by a nun I've remembered all these years.
 
A few years ago, I had to stand in a cold room (wtf can't they heat these places?) next to a big stainless steel machine that was supposed to measure some parameter - fortunately not the girth, which surely was negative at that point - while a cute lab tech in white who resembled the woman on Dr House's staff "monitored" at a respectful distance. We tried everything: Conversation about the weather, politics, California... anything not related to medicine or organs. Nothing doing. She came over and tied a little ribbon gently around it. I don't see how this could have helped, but hey, these people do this stuff every day. No go. Then she brought over a basin with warm water, dipping my hand into that. All this went on for at least 30 minutes before we gave up.
 
I suppose there is a moral to all of this, right? In the service, they tell you, "Airman, the general zips his pants up the same way you do." The next time you are irritated by a presumptuous male, picture him in one of the above situations.
 
Maybe a commentor will have an even more intense experience with medical humiliation?