I LIKE BRIDGET
This post is, perhaps, long overdue. You see, dear reader, I like Bridget.
Yes, I still like the wife, rather a lot, and no, I do not like Bridget in that way. I should probably explain...
About a month ago I finally switched doctors, after being told that my somewhat mysterious symptomatology was all probably just in my head. Thus, eventually, I finally ended up in Bridget's office.
Now let us flash forward a wee bit, skipping over Thor, an awkward experience, and Thor once again...
This past Thursday – again, I apologize for the inexcusable belatedness of this post – I went in, accompanied by the wife, to see Bridget once again. Readied for further confusion and uncertainty we sat down in our assigned examination room at about nine forty-five. We briefly reviewed the conclusions offered by Thor, and returned, once again, to the question, "What the hell is wrong with you?"
This, dear reader, is not quite why I like Bridget, but it is getting there. I am rather pleased that I, at long last, have a doctor who, when confronted with the quandary that is me asks this question rather than declaring that there cannot, indeed, be anything wrong with me since he or she does not immediately know what it might be.
At first Bridget started us along one track of thought as we talked about specifics of my symptoms. She asked questions; I answered. I asked questions; she answered. The wife asked questions; Bridget answered. Bridget wrote things down and began to order tests. Then it happened. Bridget stood up, excused herself, and left the room. I must admit we were momentarily befuddled, but when she returned a moment later, both my and the wife's eyes lit up. We smiled – or at least I think we did; we did so in my recollection thereof. Bridget sat back down in her little rolly, spinny stool with a right large medical text.
If you know me, or the wife, at all you will recognize the source of our pleasure. We both love a researcher, and firmly believe that the source of, well pretty much everything, is books. I love that I have a doctor that will bust out the ole textbooks right in front of me, who has no fear of admitting she doesn't have the answer, who is willing to roll up the old sleeves and stare at the fine print right in front of the patient instead of offering some platitude and double-checking under the cover of dark.
So, Bridget started flipping through the pages, eyes following her index finger as she scanned down diagnosis trees and lists of symptoms and correlations. After a few more minutes she popped up once again and departed again only to return once more with a thicker, larger book packed with yet longer lists of, to me, inscrutable words. More questions, answers, and occasional banter followed until, a further forty-five minutes later, the wife and I left the office with a trip to the endocrinologist in the works, another battery of blood tests scheduled, and an MRI of my itty-bitty pituitary gland in the offing at some god-awful early hour in the morning one day next week [and not the friendly open kind, but the sort in which they slide you into the exceedingly narrow tube for an hour and bombard you with whatever rays it is they cultivate from outer space to actually see inside of your brain].
I still may not know the answer to the now age-old question – "What the hell is wrong with you [me]" – but I do, at least like Bridget.
Yes, I still like the wife, rather a lot, and no, I do not like Bridget in that way. I should probably explain...
About a month ago I finally switched doctors, after being told that my somewhat mysterious symptomatology was all probably just in my head. Thus, eventually, I finally ended up in Bridget's office.
Now let us flash forward a wee bit, skipping over Thor, an awkward experience, and Thor once again...
This past Thursday – again, I apologize for the inexcusable belatedness of this post – I went in, accompanied by the wife, to see Bridget once again. Readied for further confusion and uncertainty we sat down in our assigned examination room at about nine forty-five. We briefly reviewed the conclusions offered by Thor, and returned, once again, to the question, "What the hell is wrong with you?"
This, dear reader, is not quite why I like Bridget, but it is getting there. I am rather pleased that I, at long last, have a doctor who, when confronted with the quandary that is me asks this question rather than declaring that there cannot, indeed, be anything wrong with me since he or she does not immediately know what it might be.
At first Bridget started us along one track of thought as we talked about specifics of my symptoms. She asked questions; I answered. I asked questions; she answered. The wife asked questions; Bridget answered. Bridget wrote things down and began to order tests. Then it happened. Bridget stood up, excused herself, and left the room. I must admit we were momentarily befuddled, but when she returned a moment later, both my and the wife's eyes lit up. We smiled – or at least I think we did; we did so in my recollection thereof. Bridget sat back down in her little rolly, spinny stool with a right large medical text.
If you know me, or the wife, at all you will recognize the source of our pleasure. We both love a researcher, and firmly believe that the source of, well pretty much everything, is books. I love that I have a doctor that will bust out the ole textbooks right in front of me, who has no fear of admitting she doesn't have the answer, who is willing to roll up the old sleeves and stare at the fine print right in front of the patient instead of offering some platitude and double-checking under the cover of dark.
So, Bridget started flipping through the pages, eyes following her index finger as she scanned down diagnosis trees and lists of symptoms and correlations. After a few more minutes she popped up once again and departed again only to return once more with a thicker, larger book packed with yet longer lists of, to me, inscrutable words. More questions, answers, and occasional banter followed until, a further forty-five minutes later, the wife and I left the office with a trip to the endocrinologist in the works, another battery of blood tests scheduled, and an MRI of my itty-bitty pituitary gland in the offing at some god-awful early hour in the morning one day next week [and not the friendly open kind, but the sort in which they slide you into the exceedingly narrow tube for an hour and bombard you with whatever rays it is they cultivate from outer space to actually see inside of your brain].
I still may not know the answer to the now age-old question – "What the hell is wrong with you [me]" – but I do, at least like Bridget.
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