Take my Medical Hx

Please.

Published in

The Coffeelicious

7 min readMar 24, 2016

Here in Austin — which, according to urban legend, is The Allergy Capital of the World — we’ve had an unpredictable not-Winter. (You know, aside from Valentine’s Day schlock appearing on shelves by December 27.)

Spring, that dirty slut, has been trotting her wares out to the curb since December to make ends.

Call it climate change. Blame El Niño. Point at the “scourge” of Cedar Fever, as Texas Monthly dubs it.

Doesn’t matter.

Assigning blame. Figuring it out. Fixing what’s not fixable. Pushing water up a hill. Or, as Bill Cosby once said about teenagers, nailing Jello to a tree.

(J-E-L-L-O, prick.)

Accept what is.

Meditate more.

Pray harder.

Fake it til you make it.

Just keep swimming.

Gut it out. Suck it up. Grin and bear it. It could always be worse.

I had such high hopes for this year.

I had hoped that once the holidays were over, I could start to rebuild.

I’d reached a stage in my grief where the fog was lifting, the psych meds were dialed in, new clients were promising contracts would be signed. Any. Day. Now.

We got through our first Christmas without Mom. I got through the introductions (and ass-sniffings) of my dad and my boyfriend.

I gutted it out. Dug deep. Tapped (and drained) energy reserves from at least the pre-Cambrian.

Before Dad arrived, with yet another load of Mom’s stuff, I spent hours at thrift shops, looking for the perfect shirt to go with my classy black slacks. In case Dad wanted to take us out for a fancy Christmas meal. The shirt had to be fancy and match both my style and the festive sparkle of the season. But it couldn’t be red. Or sexy.

I figured it should be black. Because black is classy. And mourning. Cover all the bases.

He declined to go for a fancy Christmas meal. He’s saving his money for my inheritance.

I found the shirt, by the way. $7.99.

What a fun game this is.

I made $29k last year.

I spent $15k on “healthcare” — premiums, prescriptions, acupuncture, Traditional Chinese Medicine, therapeutic massage, chiropractic, art therapy, psychiatry.

And, dear ol’ Dad’s saving money for my inheritance.

For later. For when I need it.

It’s been a few months since the last time he asked why I don’t charge more from my clients.

When I was working at [Big Soul-Sucking Corp], consultants routinely made $150 per hour — no, $200, $250 per hour — and nobody batted an eye.
They’re taking advantage of you, hon. They’re laughing because you don’t know enough to charge more. You should be making a lot more.

How many recessions ago was that, Dad?

Today, he asked if I’ve lost my vim.

Ha. Ah, yah, ha. My vim and my vigor, Dad. Yah.
I’m trying to grow them back. But I’ve only been off antibiotics for four days.

(I’m also trying to grow back gut flora. And my asshole itches. I’m worried that it’s a yeast infection. I’ve been drinking kefir and taking probiotics, eating fermented foods and yogurt till I think I’m pickling myself.

But I am NOT going to talk about my itchy damn asshole with my dad.)

I feel like I’ve been sick for months.

That’s a fib. I feel like I’ve been sick for years.

But I don’t say that because I don’t want to drag him down, make him feel uncomfortable. Worse, I don’t want him to think I’m asking for advice or, God forbid, to mansplain or “fix” it.

Come to that, I watched him manage my mom’s care, intimately, daily, in exacting detail. To a point, that’s admirable, noble, selfless, and certainly a great tactical help.

Past a certain point, tho…

Mom like to say, “I’ve always said your dad’s not one to let a good criss go unmanaged.” He’ll make a crisis just so he can be in control of running it to ground.

The day before she died, she and I watched, together, as he and her doctor conferred over the room phone about her treatment options.

She was completely present, of full mental faculty to be able to damned well discuss her own treatment.

Except. Lung cancer. Diffuse infiltrates. The supplemental oxygen running at full tilt.

She couldn’t speak over the phone. Because she couldn’t take off the oxygen mask.

And they were still debating possible heroic measures.

A vignette of patriarchy.

A heart-shredding reminder that your friends in the pharma-medico-industrial complex do not accept defeat. They will not countenance failure. Death is defeat and failure. (And, I swear to God, it was a one-armed man who did it.)

Of course, there is no insurance billing code for a dead body. Once they’re dead, they’re no longer a patient, and well, we all got boat payments to make.

I certainly haven’t forgotten how Dad over-bored doctors, nurses, and med techs throughout my childhood, cowing entire medical teams (or trying to). Managing the crisis, jingling keys and change in his pockets until staff politely asked him to wait outside.

I didn’t want to be scolded for complaining or whining or having a negative attitude because maybe if I had a positive attitude, I’d be healthier.

I might as well have gone for it and said — I feel like I’ve been sick for years. I feel beat down. I feel emptied and turned inside out. I’m running on fumes. I’m exhausted. I don’t have the energy to keep house, let alone “hustle” up new work. Thanks for asking, Dad. It means a lot to me that you want to be a part of my life and that you care about how I’m doing. I could really use some of that inheritance now.” — because I got the speech anyway.

I’m worried about you, hon.
You used to be a lot more positive.

He’s not wrong.

I used to have a mom. An in-the-flesh mom. I could call on the phone.

I used to be a teenager with the whole world before me. Free, white, and 21, as they sometimes rudely say.

Awash in American privilege and white privilege, cis privilege and straight privilege. Educated, literate, ableist privilege. Held cozy and safe in the bosom of the adult-incubator known as University. Then co-ops and internships, then the easy transition back to the welcoming soporific of the masses, Suburbia. I used to be upper-middle-class.

“Hon, you can do anything you set your mind to,” voices echo from the analog reels of the past. The flickering images lighting the cave walls.

All time is unredeemable.
What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in a world of speculation.
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
~ T. S. Eliot, Burnt Norton, Four Quartets

Now I’m jaded, tired, disillusioned, grief-struck, heart-broke and mended, broke and mended — the light slivers and slants — broke busted.

I think this must be Part One of a series. Because I haven’t gotten around to the title — Take my medical history. Please.

I haven’t told you about the “opportunity” to see an(other) integrative physician who’s studied with (another) Alternative Medicine Guru. And pay $495 for the privilege. For 90m. (You’re right, Dad. I’m not charging enough.)

Will this doc be like the others? Fill out umpteen pages of medical history for them, and they act like they’re seeing it for the first time when they sit down, late, to your initial appointment.

When I gave my medical history to my coordinating physician at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN, three years ago, she cried. That was about the most validating and therapeutic part of the experience.

To be fair, Mayo is an amazing place and I loved it. Rochester is built for and around the hospital complex. Everybody’s like a part of your medical team. The hotel staff, wait staff, book store, movie theater — they’re all connected by tunnels so you don’t have to get cold running from appointment to appointment.

After my sleep study, I went to the hair salon and said, “Look, I don’t need a hair cut, but can you to wash this out of my hair?” The cement from the electrodes — that shit don’t play. I was not the first to request this. A little TLC from a human who isn’t booked to see 70 more people.

Huh. Hair stylists see fewer clients per day than physicians see patients.