It’s that time of year again.  When you get a little note in the mail from your doctor’s office telling you to pop in for your pap in.  Pap smear, that is.  I don’t know anyone that gets excited over doctor visits.  Just the thought of one gives me a low level panic attack.

I am a classic case of white coat paranoia.  I smell death everywhere in the exam room and see the grim reaper himself in a lab coat.  Okay, so I have a Chicken Little type of irrationality, but what do you see when you walk into a gynecologist’s office?  Needles and probes and some sort of steely aluminum shit in the corner that looks like an effed up version of Wall-e.  My first thought when I saw that machine was god damn, where the hell is he going to stick that?  I don’t think I have any hole in me big enough. 

But then again, doctors know more about your body than you do.  They also have their own unique way of relating the news to you. I ask my cardiologist what’s up with my heart and he’ll say well, you have paroxysmal supra ventricular tachycardia and/or quite possibly idiopathic ventricular tachycardia and I’ll open up my eyes big and wide, lie through my teeth, and say oh, yeah, of course! okay, that makes total sense now!, even more effing confused than before I asked the question and mentally ticking off the way I’d like things to be done at my funeral.  Dear Mr.John Hopkins, you need a crash course in how to explain non deadly afflictions in less deadly sounding terminology.

These cats look very much like I do during and after said scenario.

As bad as it is, a cardiologist visit is nothing compared to an appointment with the gynecologist.  Having someone who looks like my grandfather tell me to lay back and spread my legs is disconcerting, to say the least.  They also seem very suspicious of my efforts at losing the baby weight over there.  It might have something to do with the fact that the baby starts kindergarten next year.

The question of so are you going to have more kids? is inevitable and I can’t answer Gee, I don’t even know when the next time I’m going to take a piss is.  I’m guessing it’ll be when you ask me to do it in a cup, but neither one of us knows for sure, right?  They of all people should know that kids don’t ask for an invite.  They just show up, as did my youngest, and leave you wondering where did you come from?!  I’ve had my uterus securely under lock, key, and alarm system since then.  Only god can hack that code.

Speaking of which, good god,  doctors love to judge you.  The way they ask how many partners have you had, with steely gaze fixed, makes you squirm and wonder if even that man who tried to feel you up in the crowded elevator counts, with the afterthought of damn, that was eight years, two kids, and some pounds ago.  If I gave him the offer today he would probably refuse.

The biggest bummer of all is that most medical professionals look more like Dr.Phil than Derek Shepherd.

versus

Then there’s the trust issue.  He’ll assure you he’s gentle when his speculum wielding leaves you requesting a fucking epidural, but if at the same time he tells you you have esophageal hepatitis type F aortic kidney disease with inflamed pulmonary hardening of the abdominal cavity, you’ll believe him.  I bet half the people reading this thought that shit was real.

Don’t let this post take away from all the good doctors do, though.  Don’t think that.  You know what I’m talking about.  That sneaky little thought that if a doctor did any real work, he’d be called a nurse.  That kind of thinking is not nice.  Sure, he might only pop in for five minutes, but those five minutes are enough for someone with years of medical experience and if he was any better at what he did, he’d fix whatever was wrong with you with a twitch of his mouth and only the halo over his head as a light source.  Unless he graduated from shadymedschool.com, in which case I’d fly my ass right outta there.  Doctors do 95 percent of the good in this world, if you don’t count the one that performed Dick Cheney’s heart transplant.  That mofo should’ve known better.

Coming up next, The Doctor’s Version : A Rebuttal.  Spoiler ahead : Includes pissed off as hell MD’s who claim they are unfairly blamed for all medical problems of every fucking patient we come across.  Might also include diagnosis of put down the Fritos and get on treadmill for smart ass female patient. 

Disclaimer : That was a joke and I don’t promise any future posts on a doctor’s version of the shit he has to endure at the hands of whiny patients when he just tells them stuff for their own effing good.  I mean, where would I find someone like that?

Cat pics courtesy of https://catmacros.wordpress.com/tag/biting-sarcasm/.   McDreamy pic courtesy of my dreams.  Dr.Phil pic courtesy of just pick any effing place, he’s all over the internet anyway.