Doctor, Doctor!

Raise your left elbow if you'd rather do cartwheels down the highway than go to the doctor.

* Raising my right, oops, left elbow *

Ok, now that we have that out in the open I guess I can tell you:  going to the doctor is NOT my favorite thing.  Growing up, I was always the "sick" child in my family.  You know, the one who always got a cold twice in a school year, the clumsy one who had at trip to the ER at least a couple times a year for various injuries where blood was shed or concussions had.

Now the dentist has never bothered me, nor has going to the hospital.  I watched my dad battle cancer for 5 years, so PET scans, life support ventilators, chemo and radiation machines don't scare me like they do most people.  CAT scans, MRIs, ultrasounds, IV's, going under the knife for whatever surgeries - you name it, I've probably done it.  And hey, specialists always have cool looking diagrams and 3-D replicas of different parts of the body to play with in their exam rooms.  So why is it that just going to see my general physician  bothers the heck out of me?

That's a darn good question!  And this morning, I had an hour and a half to think if over as I sat, squirming in the waiting room of one of the two doctors offices Mayberry has to offer.

I was just there a week ago, but one shot and a round of antibiotics and breathing treatments later and what was an upper respiratory infection, a sinus infection and an inner ear infection has now turned into full blown asthmatic bronchitis, plus sinus and inner ear infections.  Yay me.  My doctor wanted to put me in the hospital, but I think I can manage just fine with yet a shot in the rump of something stronger and a bigger dose of a much more expensive antibiotic.

Thankfully, she did inform me that if I would have waited a couple of days it would be pneumonia, which means a hospital stay, which means I couldn't go to work, which means I'd lose my mind.  And we just flat out can't have that.  Besides, I don't make a good patient.  You can ask every nurse who has ever had to take care of me, including my mom.  They'd set you straight very quickly.

But, after all this thinking I think I finally put my finger on what it is I dislike about being at a regular doctor's office: there are sick people there.  Some kids are just looking for a way to skip school, others elderly men wear their WWII hats with pride as they drag their oxygen tanks behind them.  Then there's the mother with her sick infant all covered up in the carrier, worry written all over her face as to what could possibly be wrong with her child.

Then there's me.  A seemingly "healthy" and "normal" mid-twenties chick at first, but once I coughed... oh boy did that baby wake up! 

Here's hoping the latest shot will do the trick and the prescription cough syrup hasn't gone all to my head too quickly.

I must not be held responsible for anything I might post later tonight.  That is all.