Vindication

It is customary in the military, to try and get an appointment with a doctor for a serious issue (such as crushing bone pain) and not be seen for 6 weeks or more. However, for some strange reason, I was reassigned to a new primary care doctor even though my previous doctor was still at the clinic ... lucky me.

So, my husband usually had to take the day off to take me to the doctor (because at the time we lived 10 miles away from the military base in Germany), or go and sleep because he always worked midnight shift and never got enough sleep. Sleep deprivation is a huge problem in the military, and, in my rather biased but not unfounded opinion, is inhumane. My husband was worked to death while we lived in Germany. Those three years of work were miserable for him, so taking me to the doctor meant sleeping wherever, whenever, however.

So, at the clinic, we wait together. He's, as usual, tired as all hell and is desperately trying to stay awake to be supportive of me, and at the same time desperately trying to catch up on the last 2 years of sleep deprivation. But, unlike any other doctor's visit I have ever had, before the doctor will see me, she insists I go down to X-ray.

Well.

I guess I don't have to bring out the brass knuckles.

10 minutes later, I'm back in the doctor's office, and she's looking rather amazedly at my x-rays. She's looking at the screen, and in her sophisticated British accent says "You were right to come in. You've got a rather serious fracture." She turns to me and picks up my right hand in hers and starts poking and prodding. I'm practically screaming in pain during this, and she says "Let's get you something strong for the pain." I love this doctor instantly.

Dr. R explained a bunch of technical information about my wrist. She says she sees that a particularly important bone that moves my wrist around is fractured rather severely, and it looks dead. I'll have to see the top specialist for this she says. Then, she gives me hefty doses of vicodin and flexeril to ease my pain and tells me to go down to X-ray and ask for a copy of today's pictures.

Let me just officially say, on the record, that I'm light as a feather coming out of that office into my husband's arms. Dr. R comes out with me to say "You were coming in to battle me, weren't you?" I concur. My husband tells her we've never ever had an X-ray done because no one will listen to the symptoms. Dr. R said that just by reading what I wrote on my information sheet as to what the visit was about - that X-ray was the first thing that had to be done to rule anything out.

I couldn't believe how amazingly lucky I got that day. A new doctor with an agenda. And, furthermore, for the year that I had her, she never disappointed me. I never minded waiting for her if she took longer with patients or was brisk but calculating. She knew what she was doing and, unlike MANY doctors, she really wanted to help and WAS helping.

Vindication never felt so good. For the last (almost) decade, I had been crushed miserably by pain, by failure, by losing my livelihood ... I finally felt grateful for once. I felt grateful for that prissy British doctor who took her job seriously, I felt grateful that I hadn't given up, I felt grateful for all the torture and B.S. I went through to get this far. Never again would someone tell me I had tendonitis, tennis elbow, or worse - carpal tunnel that doesn't register a reading in nerve testing so there'd be nothing they could do about it.

Finally, I had an answer.