Doctors who don't suck

Monday

Today I head downtown to see 2 new and different doctors for a 2nd opinion, since the last one was crap. I’m going to my appointments with my appropriately dour and cynical friend Motria, who will step in if needed to deliver a stern invective along the lines of “where did you get your training, the Soviet Union? Pashli!” Motria and I are both of Ukrainian descent, and our people are a sturdy, stubborn lot – that whole hearty peasant stock that got our people through arctic winters. These doctors, we will break them.

My morning appointment is with the surgeon, and I’m hanging out waiting to see her when lo, who should come walking into the room but her assistant, aka a McHotty. Hello! Finally, some eye candy! Right then and there I decide, I’m in with these people. While some may make their decisions on doctors and such based on external factors like experience, etc., I’m just going with looks. Seems as good as anything.

After I chat with him, he leaves and in comes the doctor, a spritely, smiley woman who immediately wins me over when she proclaims that she can see from my address that we live close to each other, and thus she doesn’t want to get on my bad side. This speaks of brilliance on her part. Then she goes through the list of diseases I don’t have (lupus, plague, typhoid) and notes my disgustingly good health and healthy lifestyle, and proclaims how “that’s great, that’ll really help you out.”

Me: Well, it hasn’t done much for me so far.
Her: Oh, but it will, trust me – it really helps!
Me, firmly: I’ve already decided - I’m embracing a carcinogenic lifestyle: maraschino cherries. Tab. Charred meats.
Her, laughing: Oh noooooo. But please, no hot dogs!
Me, even more firmly: Charred hot dogs.

She covers her face with her hands. But best of all, she then says she sees no reason why I would need a mastectomy, that she can operate to remove the lump and then have the plastic surgeon do whatever fixing and reconstruction is necessary. Hallelujah! At least I no longer feel like I’m in a Monty Python skit: “Oh, we’ll lop off some body parts, you won’t mind. It’ll just be a flesh wound. Your feet hurt? We’ll just take those off too! No sense waiting for bigger problems to develop, might as well be proactive. What was that you were saying about headaches?”

After deciding that I’ll see the plastic surgeon on Tuesday – and she warns me that plastic surgeons are “a different breed” and that I should take what he says with a grain of salt – we agree to meet again next Monday to figure out a plan, after I’ve seen the other doctors. I find Motria hanging out in the waiting room, being held hostage to a man and his mother as he reads aloud to her the extremely long questionnaire: “Mom, have you ever had shingles? No? How about VD?” Oy.

We then go downstairs for lunch and coffee. Here I will note that at the Bangs Lake triathlon on Sunday, I was toodling along on my bike and lo, what should come darting out from the bushes on the far end of the street and go running across RIGHT in front of my bike? Yes, a long-haired pure black cat. At that point, I raised my hand in the classic WTF gesture and said “A black cat?? Oh, come ON!” If this were an After School Special on tv, with me being played by a plucky yet cynical Ellen Page, the writers would be jeered out of the room. “Nice job, Mr. Oh-So-Creative Screenwriter,” the producers would sneer. “What’s your next grim portending of doom, 666 written in steam in the bathroom mirror? A lurking raven? An eerie red glow emanating from the basement?” And the writer would flee in shame, deservedly so.

So with that hovering in the background, Motria and I head to the Argo tea counter in the lobby so that I can get a latte and she a chocolate croissant. And when the tea-ista rings up the purchases, the total comes to......$6.66 Really. “No, that just won’t do,” I proclaim firmly. “Motria!” I bark. “I’m getting you a drink – what kind of tea do you want?” I’m certainly not taking any chances these days. Would you?

My afternoon doctor, the oncologist, is also a pixie-sized female, and she too agrees with the surgeon, and is shocked and rather flabbergasted that the first doctors said that chemo wouldn’t work on my kind of tumor to shrink it. Apparently that’s just not true. I leave there feeling much more optimistic about the whole thing, if one can say such a thing about a future operation that will still leave me disfigured. I guess it’s all relative.

And doctors who do....

Tuesday

I head downtown again, alone this time, figuring, how bad can this be? I merely need to remain ever vigilant against an over-zealous doctor who’ll probably want to give me the Pamela Anderson-esque rack and other upgrades while he’s at it. I can handle this. No more surgery than necessary, no new chest. Period.

After waiting an hour, I finally see the doctor, who proceeds to tell me that my tumor is rather small and so he thinks I might be happy with how I look after it’s removed, without major reconstruction. Huh? I’m rather indignant, that somehow he seems to think I don’t deserve a great chest. And while I do have the perfect bosom, it’s not exactly huge in its perfection, and I can’t really see how removing a big chunk of it will leave me delighted with a lumpy/misshapen breast. I tell him this.

Me: I really can’t see that being the case.
Him: Well, it’s a small tumor so you might not even notice!
Me: 2.9 cm is considered big in the world of breast cancer – that’s why it’s stage 2. I really can’t see being happy with it as is.
Him: Well, if we do wind up doing reconstruction our options are implants or more likely taking part of a muscle from your back, the latissimus.
Me: But that won’t work – that’ll affect my swimming ability, won’t it? I do triathlons.
Him: Oh, for the kind of splashing around most people do, that won’t matter. Only people who are competitive need to be concerned.

“Splashing around”??? I look at him and think, “Deanna? Is that you?” And contemplate reaching over to see if I can peel off a mask, like in every Scooby Doo show since the beginning of time. Hmph. It’s one thing for Deanna to mock my swimming, another for this clown to do it.

Me: I aspire to greatness in my LONG-COURSE triathlons. That’s a lot of swimming.
Him: Well, you doing a lap or two, playing around in the pool, it really won’t matter.
Me, gritting my teeth: We’re not talking a LAP OR TWO. I do Ironman distance – that’s a 2.4 mile swim.
Him: Oh, we all have to make decisions that we might not be entirely happy with. There are trade-offs. But then again, you might just be happy with how things look anyway!

AARGHHHH!!! Since Deanna has decided that the whole cancer thing is a lie and is instead just a front for my impending full-scale plastic surgery, I certainly didn’t do a very good job of finding a plastic surgeon, now did I? I mean, if there’s no upgrade, what’s the damn point??