"It fits. I like it." He said to me....
Now, what is running through your mind? Me? When I read something like that I want to say: "That's what she said..." And then chuckle. Though lately chuckles are the last thing on my mind or in my heart. I know...shitty way to start off isn't it?
Well, let me take you back to the beginning. Today, I met with a surgeon, one Dr. Brian Lang. This was to serve as the follow-up to my neurologist Dr. Ani Mai's suggestion/referral to see him due to the MRA diagnosis of subclavian vein stenosis- or, clogged or compressed vein.
Now Dr. Lang is a surgeon of the vascular variety. Very experienced, well education (GO DAWGS!), and I cannot lie, kinda nice looking....I wanted, no I NEEDED to like him, trust him, right away; because this meeting, I believed, held the answer, the fix to what is wrong. Seriously. I envisioned the white OR, the anesthesia creeping into my veins, putting me to sleep. I saw myself in that groggy state of trying to wake up, with Dr. Lang peering over me, saying everything went better than expected. I would be all better. The pain and swelling would be gone forever.....
Instead what I got was a 45 minute seminar on how to read an MRA. I learned all about the vena cava (one of my favorite words in the English language, BTW) and symmetry, blood flow, arteries, you name it....I also learned that in his professional opinion and many years of experience, that while, yes I have some jacked up clogged/compressed veins, there was nothing at all he could do for me. NOTHING. And, really- he doesn't think this is a vein issue. Wrong store. Go fish....
Unflinchingly, I stated to him: "Well, I'm not sure what to do at this point. I mean, a nurse told me that I have radiation induced brachial plexiopathy."
He replied with what I wrote above. It fits, you see this paralysis diagnosis from the nurse. And, well he liked it.
Cue the tears.....
Now, I have brothers and I've been around enough men to know just how squirrely the fairer sex gets when tough broads break down. However, a trained professional who cavalierly and cockily gives someone a diagnosis of life-time paralysis should have the stones to well, take it like a man, for crying out loud.
Instead, he turned even whiter than his God-given hue, starts babbling about updating my chart and ran, YES, RAN out of the room.
Where did that leave me? Alone in a room, for starters... And, well, I sucked down the tears- because really, what was the point? First, I called my mom. "Yay! It's STILL not cancer...."And, then I phoned my gay Jewish boyfriend in New York, who replied: "What a dumbass. Get a second opinion." Yes, I can do that! I almost forgot! (HOPE!) And then called my best friend Patty Mate who replied: "Oh my GOD, get a second opinion and be sure to write him up on a comment card." (AH! Power!)
How come a second opinion never occurred to me? I have no clue. Instead, what came to mind was my Nordstrom mentality of simply returning it all. Just take it back; the cancer, the cure, the side effects, the test, the "just a little poke"... Fuck it. Nope, don't have the receipt. But, don't want it anymore. And, well, the store's policy is to accept all returns- no questions asked, right?
Though if pushed for a reason, I guess I could always say: "Well, it doesn't fit and I don't like it."
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