Polar Bears Are Mean

I had a doctor's appointment yesterday.  Sigh.  I need a new doctor.  I can see this clearly.  So can Carl, who so very kindly went along with me for moral support.  This is still the 10-15 Mile a Day Doctor I saw last year. No, I didn't find a new one yet.  But, boy,  I have to.

I think she might be a good doctor for people she likes.  She clearly doesn't like me.  I just rub her the wrong way or remind her of someone in her past or present who drove her crazy or something.  I don't know what it is.  And no, I'm not a person who has to have a doctor who knows the names of my pets, don't get me wrong.  I don't care if a doctor doesn't remember who I am.  That's fine.  They see hundreds of people.  I get that.  I'm just one more ache and pain in a rotating, shuffling line of ailing humans she has to tend to. 

I had a good doctor though, once.  Not that I spend that much time at doctors, since I've been blessed with fairly good health up to this point.  But once upon a time, I did have a good doctor.   And the way I found him was when I took my aged father in for his appointment years ago.  I was so impressed with this kindly young medical professional who took the time to talk to my 88 year old father...talk TO him, not down to him, and who so very clearly cared about the effect my father's advancing senility was having on my elderly mother and even on me.  I became one of his new patients.  That was such a blissful ten years.  Some people are born to be doctors, and he was one of them.  He cared.

But then he moved away.  To Iowa. And ever since then, time spent at the doctor's office has been far from pleasant.  I'm not a hypochondriac.  At least I don't think I am.  My goal in life is to stay away from the MD's as much as possible, but I can't always because my thyroid up and threw a hissy fit way back when I was 32 and I need meds.  And with the meds, comes the bloodwork, at least once every six months and with the blood work comes the doctor visits and this all leads us back down the path to yesterday morning. Thyroid trouble is common, I realize that, but finding a doctor who will treat it as something worth treating is not common.  When the thyroid isn't working properly or is under or over medicated, you just don't feel well.  I've been through at least five doctors since the good one left.  And lots more when you rarely see the same one twice anyway because the clinics run a rotation of different doctors through all the time.  I had hopes for my current doctor, I really did.  She came highly recommended from a cousin of mine.  (Apparently she likes my cousin.)

But back to yesterday.  What an appointment.  We walked in and waited in the exam room for what felt like an hour, but I guess was only 15 minutes.  As the time ticked by, I was getting more and more anxious.  I had time to read a few articles from Reader's Digest to Carl--one was about a poor kid who was kayaking around in icebergs somewhere with a buddy and had the bad fortune of being attacked by a polar bear while asleep in their tent.  This roaring polar bear barged in to the tent and grabbed the guy's head in his jaws, dragging him around and shaking him like a rag doll.   Luckily, he lived to tell about it, due to his friend's quick thinking (and shotgun). 

Little did I know this story was setting the stage for my upcoming doctor visit. 

The doorknob opened and in she came.  (My doctor, not the Polar Bear.) Here we go. 

She asked me how I've been.  I said I wasn't feeling too bad, really.  No more daily headaches since the CPAP machine and I feel more rested. 

Well, did I have anything that was bothering me?

Yes, I have some shortness of breath once in awhile (when I'm trudging up steps with my laundry baskets) and some days my muscles and joints ache pretty bad.  But not everyday.  Kind of a comes and goes thing. I said I'd done some reading that suggested this could be normal for someone my age going through menopause with fluctuating hormones and what not.  I asked if she had any other patients who had the hot flashes and weird feelings subside after finally getting through the other side of menopause.



Suddenly, there was a Polar Bear in the room..........

"Well, this is just like puberty.  When you were younger, did you go to bed a girl and wake up the next morning a woman?  No, you did not.  It was a gradual process. And the same thing for menopause.  It doesn't just 'happen'.  It takes time.  And every one is different.  There is no set time table for how long this will take.  I have no crystal ball, I cannot tell you that by such and such a time you will be all done with it."

"I realize that you can't give me a guarantee," I said, " But I was just wondering if you have seen patients who have an easier time of it after the roller coaster ride of up and down hormones has subsided, even if it takes five or ten years.  If I knew that in time this will all even out, I can live with the aches and pains and whatnot for a few more years."

While I was talking, she was looking at her computer and clearly looking aggravated by what I just said.  When my silly little speech wound down, she blurted out:

 "I can see your problem right here.  Do you want to know why you feel the way you do?  Why you are short of breath and your joints ache?  You have gained weight over the winter.  Look at this!  I can see that whatever you are doing for exercise is not enough.  You have to get up and do something and watch what you put in your mouth.  People do not gain weight by breathing air, it is what you are eating.  You have to get out of your chair and exercise. You need to join a gym and get a personal trainer.  You need regular, physical exercise in your life and to cut calories down to 1200 a day."

Carl then piped up, "She does exercise!  She walks every day and she gardens."

"Well, it is not enough, obviously.  Gardening is not good exercise.  It is not aerobic and very possibly you are not doing the 'exercise' you do correctly.  That is why you need a personal trainer."

I knew I had gained weight over the winter, but I also know it is on it's way back down.  The same thing happens every year, once gardening season is here, I tend to lose any weight I put on during the winter.  I know it's not a good thing, I know I'm a flawed person, I know I eat too much.  And I know I've been heavier than I am now.  And I'm not proud of it.  I shouldn't even be writing about this here, because I know how this makes me sound.  Pathetic donut eater.  (I cut out the donuts a while back, I really, really did.)

"What did you have for breakfast yesterday?" the Polar Bear MD asked. 

"A bowl of corn flakes and milk."

"How big was the bowl of corn flakes?" as she asks the question, she makes an imaginary bowl in the air, like the size of a hog trough.  "Do you measure your portions?  Do you even have a clue as to how much cereal you are eating?  And what was for lunch?  Oh, a salad?  And did you use the same size bowl for that too?  And you put dressing on it?  NO dressing is allowed, only a spritz of vinegar, no more.  And what about dinner?  Oh, you had a baked potato, well, NO more baked potatoes, no more starch, no more carbohydrates, no more bread, no more pasta, no more dessert, no.........no..........more.............."

By this time her strident voice had receded in my mind and I was the guy dangling from the jaws of the raging polar bear, being whipped from side to side staring at her glaring face as she tore me a new one. 

Ouch.

 I tried to defend myself one more time at least on the exercise thing. 

"I know you don't feel it qualifies as exercise, but I do garden extensively," I ventured cautiously.  "It's a big garden, around two acres, and last week I had over seven miles on my pedometer from working in it.  I still aim for five miles a day, though, even when I'm not gardening."

"Ah, the pedometer again.  The only way those steps count is if you are going out to exercise!  You cannot wear a pedometer all day long and then count all the steps you take as a total of exercise steps.  You have to walk the five (and I have told you before, ten, up to fifteen miles a day would be better) STRAIGHT through for exercise, no stopping and starting, for it to count.  IF you walked eight miles a day in your garden, so what?  If I kept track of all my steps in a day, you would be amazed.  No, only the actual straight walking steps count, no others! You have to devote at least an HOUR a day to exercise, and that is a minimum."

Say what?  I'm supposed to walk ten (or more!) miles a day in an HOUR?  Wow.  I'll be breaking some serious speed records if I can do that. 

And/or I only need to garden for an hour a day?  Wow.  I'll be having a pretty sorry looking garden too.

Carl piped up again, "She works very hard in the garden, I know she does.  You can't tell me it isn't work, because I do it, too, and it's tiring.  I don't see where a gym membership would be any more strenuous."

Oh, boy, here we go again.....the Polar Bear picked up Carl this time.

"I'm not saying the gym membership would be any more strenuous!  I'm saying she should quit gardening.  It's not working as exercise to keep her weight down, and she's probably doing more damage to her joints than anything else.  Pushing and pulling, lifting and hauling, and you wonder 'why' you hurt at night when you try to sleep??  Because you are getting up and down, kneeling, squatting, bending, overlifting, all the worst things to do for a body and yet, again, you 'wonder' why you hurt?  No, the gardening is a very bad thing.  Stop the gardening, get a personal trainer, lose the weight and get on with your life."  There was silence for a second and then:

"I do not know what else to tell you.  Do you want me to put in your chart that you have 'fibromyalgia'?  If I do, you will wear that title for the rest of your life and every doctor who sees it afterward will immediately think, 'Ha, another one of those people, who have 'fibromyalgia'."   

(Apparently, I am surmising that the Polar Bear thinks fibromyalgia is a catch-all phrase for a hysterical menopausal woman who really doesn't have anything wrong with her but wants attention.)

After she dropped Carl from her jaws, we both sat and stared at her, dazed.  Stop Gardening?  You might as well tell me to stop breathing. 

Carl said, "She grew up on a farm and was her father's right hand man with all the work. The gardening work isn't something new, she's worked hard all her life."

"So, she grew up on a farm.  Maybe she worked in wet, damp conditions.  Maybe she was bitten by a Lyme tick years ago.  Maybe she was overworked.  Every one is different.  My father farmed a 4000 acre farm, so what does that mean?  She's getting older.  People change.  She needs to stop gardening.  It is doing her no good.  She is getting fatter. And now, the tears.....I think you are depressed.  I really think you should be treated for depression, but I cannot force you to take the medication if you do not want to. You need to get exercise, exercise, exercise and watch what you put in your mouth!"

Yeah, I was crying.  Gads, I'm a sap.  I know.  And for her information, I had been treated for depression for many years, but once my thyroid was properly treated, I was able to go off of them, and I told her so.  And I told her that unfortunately, when I was taking the antidepressants, I weighed more than I do now.   Oh, she said, but there are other drugs out there that don't pack on the pounds, yeah, I know.  Though I was crying, I wasn't depressed.

I know depression, trust me. I garden because I love it.  It is my medication.

No, I was crying because it's safer than whacking a Polar Bear 'upside the head.  It's a more socially acceptable way of releasing tension than assault and battery.  Or firearms.  I didn't want to go to jail.  I just wanted her to stop.  And she did.  Oh, this is just the tip of the iceberg the Polar Bear made us listen to, and so much of it was contradictory.  Walk ten miles but do it in an hour.  Get a personal trainer who will teach me how to lift correctly. 

All this because I needed to have my thyroid prescription renewed and because I ventured to say that I have aches and pains at night and wondered if it was possible menopause might have something to do with it.

  I was ordered to the lab to give five vials of blood (I don't know what she's checking for, she didn't say) and I'm supposed to go to the hospital next week for a pulmonary stress test to see if I have asthma......?........because of my occasional shortness of breath.  I did give the blood, but the rest; oh, I don't know.  Asthma?  (She said she knows the reason I'm short of breath is because I am too porky, but sort of sarcastically ordered the breathing test....so I don't know if I should go through with it or not. Would you?)

I'm not going to quit gardening.

I'll try to eat better.  I'll try to work harder. 

I need a new doctor.

Preferably not of the Polar Bear persuasion.

Now, where's my hog trough?  It's time for my Corn Flakes.