Well, all's well that ends well.
It all began with a mole on Mike's chest. As Mike has spent most of his life out on a beach somewhere and the spot looked suspicious to me, I had been badgering him for months to have Dr. L take a look at it. We both know from prior experience that Dr. L will take a look about 15 seconds before he passes judgement, deadens Mike up, carves out said mole, and goes on to his next patient. I'm not sure if it's because most of Dr. L's patients are women, but he's pretty gruff toward Mike, and we like that just fine: get in, get it off, get out in less than an hour, get results in less than 2 days. None of this fussy come in for a consultation, come back a week later, waste 6 hours of your life, then 2 more weeks to hear from the lab.
Last time we went, Dr. L took a mole off Mike's back. That's the day I knew I could carry Mike's baby: I was riveted. Though Mike insisted that he didn't feel a thing, everything Dr. L did looked like it would hurt one of my own, and I had a visceral reaction to protect Mike. It was surprising that I literally had to sit on my hands to keep myself from stopping the procedure, only because such a deep voice in me was shouting to make that man stop stabbing my husband.
I didn't expect those protective feelings about somebody until I gave birth.
Anyway, it just happens that Mike's appointment was at the same time I was supposed to head to a client's office in Satartia, Mississippi. We agreed that as Mike had to drive us both home (the whole visceral experience left me wiped out and somewhat nauseated), it wasn't necessary for me to tag along and that he would take care of everything himself.
Next came Mom's eye. Have you ever seen somebody blow out a blood vessel in their eye? It doesn't hurt at all, but there's a lot of blood for such a sensitive area of the body, and it looks downright gnarly. Mom had recently changed a medication, so though she wasn't in any pain, she decided to err on the safe side and have it checked out. No big deal, no she didn't need me to go to the doctor with her.
And anyway, you guessed it: same time I was going to be in Satartia.
I was on my way home when Mike called first: "Since it was on my chest, I was able to watch this time. It was pretty gross. I had to sit down." Translation: it was gross enough that Mike almost passed out himself. Ha! He thought I was being a weenie last time. "Mike, do you need me to come and get you?" (knowing it would be at least an hour and a half before I could make it) "No, no, I'm on the road right now. Just wanted to let you know it was done."
Great. My recently-grossed-out-and-cut-up-husband is driving around and talking on the cell phone.
I was in the middle of a cotton field in the Delta when Mom called next: "I'm in the recovery room. They had to cut something out of my eye." What do you mean, out of your eye?!? Lymphoma is a weird thing and can apparently manifest itself on the eyeball. And the only way to find out is to actually cut out a sample and send it off to a pathologist.
Excellent. My recently-dilated-deadened-and-biopsied-on-her-eyeball mom is about to be woozily driving around and talking on the cell phone. And the doctor said it was OK, so there's nothing I can do about it.
No wonder I have migraines.
It's a wonder I wasn't stopped for speeding: my mind in a thousand different directions, and none of them included the road on which I was driving at the time. The day had snowballed from no-big-deal doctor appointments to samples taken out of somebody's eye, and that was just not acceptable. And though I was not necessarily needed at either of said appointments, it would have been nice to be there for moral support, hold a hand, or even to be able to drive the wounded home.
Welcome to motherhood: check your control over life at the door.
I found Mike at the house, gearing up to move furniture in the office. As he was supposed to keep the bandages (!!!) clean for 24 hours, he figured a trip to the pool was out. I had also convinced him not to mow the lawn or go for a run. So the next logical step would be moving filing cabinets and a pre-World-War II desk that weighs roughly 2.5 tons. Um, no. His bandage was so packed, it honestly looked like he had been stabbed.
In an effort to keep the man still, I decided we had to go check on Mom. She didn't look much better: the eye looked like she'd been socked. Between the two of them, they made Fight Club look like a bunch of pansies.
But as I mentioned, all's well that ends well. Over the next few days, we learned that neither Mike's mole nor Mom's eye had any traces of cancer, and though they were the worse for wear, they have both almost completely recovered. It was worth it in the end to know the good news. Mom will have to return to have her eye checked on by professionals, and Mike and I both were surprised at the size of the incision on his chest.
It's ok Honey. Chicks dig scars.
Photos courtesy of icanhascheezburger and Huffington Post.
0 comments:
Post a Comment