Skip to main content

Have a nice day (part two)~

I left the doctor's office, with an appointment for, among other things, a pelvic scan. From the description, I gathered the procedure would be just like the ultrasound I'd had when pregnant with David: drink 32 ounces of water to fill my bladder and provide a clear window through which to visualize the uterus; lay on the exam table while a cold gelled probe is run across my belly, directing rays of some sort into my internal parts.

At first it was exactly like that. Quick and familiar, done fully dressed, with my jeans unzipped. If I craned my neck, I could see my uterus on TV, not as icky as the show I watched when my routine age-fifty colonoscopy was done. The technician finished and told me to empty my bladder. Medical people never say, "Go pee."

I thought I was done, but there was part two. She told me to undress from the waist down-- they never say, "Take your pants off," either-- and lie back down on the table. There was an internal scan she needed to do.

"Now," she said, "before I show you the probe, I want to tell you that much of it is the handle."

"Okay," I said. Wild thoughts flitted through my mind, along with jokes I felt would be considered inappropriate, and might give her the wrong impression about me.

She turned, and held a white phallic-shaped probe that would be the envy of many a man, had it been flesh and blood. I relaxed. I could handle that, I knew. My first birth was completed with the aid of forceps, a salad-tong like instrument with the length and breadth of an eagle's wingspan, that is inserted in the vagina to pull the reluctant newborn down the birth canal. My third baby was nine pounds, four ounces. The probe looked harmless.

I lay under a sheet, on my back, in a position quite familiar to women. At her request I inserted the probe, then she took over at the controls.

I felt like a video game. The object was to find the fibroids and other internal creatures before they caused problems. The technician held the joystick, and played with an intensity I've seen in video game addicts. I refrained from mentioning the joystick image, afraid that she'd think I found some pleasure in the procedure. I didn't.

When it was over, I said, "I'll bet you never said, "When I grow up, I want to . . .'" I stopped, not knowing how to say what I was thinking.

She laughed. "I'm lucky," she said. "I got to do what I always wanted, to be a hairdresser. Then I changed careers, and I absolutely love this job."

Holding a finger to her lips, she hinted that things looked good-- internally. We chatted a while, found some mutual connections, there are always connections of some sort. Like me, her parents were teachers.

"Have a nice day," she said, leaving me in the dimly lit room to put my jeans back on.

---
Click below for more "nice days."

Have a nice day (part 1)

Have a Nice Day (part 3)

Comments

Frances Mackay said…
This is a bit close to home Ruth. But a good piece of writing. I've just been to the Surgeon for my yearly review. Hope everything comes back clear for you... It is amazing what common ground you find with others, even in situations like this. I left a comment on your Muse piece. Loved that. Frances.

Popular posts from this blog

For Alice~ She's home!!!!!!!

What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson Sometimes it's all about knowing that loved ones and friends stand behind you, knowing that support is there on the down days, the worry days, the days when you feel off-center, out of sync, bedraggled emotionally, and in pain, but knowing all the while that you're not alone. You're not alone... Alice is an online friend--she lives in Hawaii-- who belongs to the writer's workshop that I do. We've only "met" online, but those who have online friendships know that they can be just as strong as those in-person relationships. Alice was hit by a car while walking, and is in the rehab phase of things. She's working to regain mobility after a broken pelvis, a broken arm, and a broken nose. It's scary to realize how, in the blink of an eye, life can lurch and our plans for a time are displaced by survival and healing. We...

Cancer is the asshole~

Today was the first time in a long, long time that I’ve called Bruce an asshole—and the first time since his cancer diagnosis. How can you call some one with cancer an asshole? After all, cancer patients don’t feel good--they’re dealing with a deadly disease, there are all sorts of worries, frustrations, and side effects and changes to their bodies, quality of life issues... and all the other little quirky symptoms that I only find out about about when Bruce tells his nurse. I’m pretty patient and understanding by nature, and all the more so now when he vents the inevitable “ cancer anger ” a little (or a lot). Today he got impatient and snippy, frustrated that we couldn’t merge our iCalendars—he hates when technology goes awry. Who doesn't? For him, it's one more thing out of his control. He started to tell me what I’d done incorrectly in the attempt to merge, and kept cutting me off when I tried to show him what I did...which, by the way, was corre...

The need to say it~

I live happily in my own head, content and entertained by my own ponderings and observations. This outward look/inward analysis serves the writer in me well. I'm a bit isolated during the time it takes to transfer words from head to paper. The process requires uninterrupted time while the download takes place. Usually I listen to the words in my head and type them-- an easy flow from mind to lap top. Who needs a pen and paper these days? I ignore a multitude of distractions around me to the point that my husband will complain, "You don't remember a thing I tell you." Huh? Has he spoken? It's not that I've forgotten, exactly; it's more like I never heard him in the first place. I could well have looked him in the eye while he told me he had a meeting at six o'clock, but my look would have been the vacant stare of a sleepwalker. I may even have nodded and given an affirmative mmm, hmmm, but I didn't absorb a thing. The thread of my own thought was st...