Doctors

I love doctors. You will almost never hear me say a negative word about them. They look great in their white coats carrying clipboards. By now, you must realize, in this country looking great is of primary importance. It doesn’t matter whether you know what you are doing, if you look great then everything’s okey-doke. Take celebrities for example, they get away with all kinds of stuff, just because they look great. So, remember if you need to get away with a crime, always look your best. This may be why embezzlers wear such nice expensive suits. They look tremendous, and no one suspects. Except for Mr. Ohh! that is, and now you because I have educated you all. What a great educational post this is. Now, where was I? Oh, yes, doctors.

Doctors are highly educated. They go to school for eight long years, only to work like a slave making almost nothing as a resident. They deal with everything from a minor sore throat to life and death situations. Why, they even know what a Laparoscopic Myocardial Bilateral Cystectomy is. (That hurts my fingers just typing it.) Yes, doctors are great, but they have one minor flaw, and it’s really not so minor. It seems their brain shuts down if you answer a question in a way they feel it shouldn’t be answered. Allow me to elucidate. (Doctors even know what ‘elucidate’ means).

My wife

A while back, when my lovely wife was pregnant with my son. Twenty-one years back, to be exact. She came to me and uttered the clarion call. She said, “It’s Time.” Now, if you’ve ever had a pregnant woman around, you know these are two words have great meaning. These two words get things moving, and have probably changed the course of people’s lives. I barely had to whisper “It’s Time” to my assistant, and she jumped up and immediately cleared my day. I said “It’s Time” to my boss, and he had security escort me out of the building. By the way, saying “It’s Time,” to a cop, got me out of an eighty-dollar speeding ticket. Of course, my wife wasn’t pregnant at that time, but you do what you can.

You see, “It’s Time” comes after nine months of fear, joy, anger, frustration, and hormones. Also, all the folks around you have gone through it all with you. Therefore, at the proper time, those two little words are the most welcome thing I know of. Yes, I loved being able to say, “It’s Time,” because everyone I said it to jumped at my command. Even all those smarty-pants doctors, which brings me back to the story.

Mr. Ohh!

Now we had rehearsed several times, as the book suggested, so I was okay. I picked up the pre-packed suitcase, helped my ailing wife to the car, and loaded them both in. Then I drove only slightly over the speed limit to the hospital. We made our way to the fifth-floor birthing suites, and I was a glowing example of Super-Father because I was prepared. Sadly, then the questions started, and with each one I lost a little more confidence. Is there any fluid? “Whiskey?” How far apart are the contractions? “Three-feet?” How long are they? “Hours?” When did they start? “President’s Day?” Who’s your doctor? “Dr. Seuss?” Do you have insurance? “Homeowners, and car?” What’s your favorite color? Who was the 15^th president of the United States? If a train leaves Baltimore at 9:00 … All right maybe I’m exaggerating a little, but suffice it to say there were a lot of them, and they were all bringing me down.

Please remember, my wife was in pain, and I was overwhelmed. So even though the various questions were aimed at her, I had to answer most of them. I’m proud to say I only lost my cool a little, and we made it through with minimal stumbling. Yes I answered them all, although I wouldn’t bet any of them were correct. Then came the big one. The one I was not prepared for. It took me off guard. It was the first question directed solely at me. “Do you want to cut the cord?” In the heat of the moment, all I could say was “Yuuuuuck!!” However, I recovered quickly and gave my true answer “No.”

Everyone and No one in particular

The room went silent. All the doctors and nurses stopped, and looked at me as if I was eating cockroaches. They had all snapped. Someone finally said, “You don’t need to decide right now,” only then did the chaos continue. A short time later I was asked again. My answer was still no, although without the “yuck” part. The doctor looked at me as if I was speaking in tongues. She shook her head and wrote something down on her clipboard. I was embarrassed, and felt like an outcast, but at least it was written down, and I would not be asked again. Ohh, how wrong I was. Every doctor, and nurse which happened to walk by, asked me again. Some even looked at the clipboard before they asked, as if to imply it must have been written down incorrectly. I counted that infernal question over twelve times in one hour, and once almost agreed to it just to stop their stupid asking. But no, I stood my ground, against the odds, like the marines on Iwo Jima. Then the 7:00 shift change happened, and it started all over again.

What was it that confused them so? It was a question, and questions by definition have more than one possible answer. Sadly, not one of their overstuffed doctor brains could comprehend my negative answer. With all their education nobody explained, to them, what ‘No’ means. You’d think some college professor would have mentioned it. With the strong lack of this knowledge, I witnessed, maybe there should have been a semester med school course, ‘Meaning Of “No” 301’ I think 301 is better because if their college experience was anything like mine, their first year is most likely lost in a beer-infused haze.

And the others. (Did I leave anyone out?)

I have written the AMA and asked for an investigation into this matter. I mean, what other simple words are missing from the basic medical school curriculum? Or an even worse case, what if medical school crams so much into their alcohol-preserved brains that it causes the simple stuff to fall out? This could be a real problem. What if putting on pants drops out? What if eating is lost, and several of them starve to death. This has very serious ramifications. Am I the only one who has noticed this?

Well eventually my wife started delivering the baby, and the doctors went back into their professional yet secluded reality, no longer troubled with the foreign word which had confused them. I think I probably would have been asked again, and maybe I was. Perhaps, they finally realized what ‘No’ meant when they saw I wouldn’t be up to the task. You see, I was passed out on the floor at the crucial moment. Of course, she might have tried to give me the scissors, I don’t know. I was unconscious at the time.