Fibbing to the doc!
Iam a great fan of the health page in the various magazines – both local and foreign – I regularly read. For instance, the first thing I do when opening Reader’s Digest is to find out what’s new on the medical horizon these days. And it has to be admitted that there’s a great deal going on in the world of health science.
In addition to all this printed knowledge, there is the computer to point me to various YouTube videos, which let me know about all kinds of new discoveries and innovative healthcare ideas. I try out everything that I can possible attempt.
Sometime back I read an article that advised me on how to get rid of a pain in the neck. I couldn’t resist chortling happily and telling my Dearly Beloved that I’d found a method to eliminate him.
Unsurprisingly, he didn’t share my mirth. But what I found really irritating recently was when some expert who is unknown to me recommended: “Whenever you see a doctor, make sure to tell him everything.”
Was he out of his mind? Doctors ask you enough unnecessary questions as it is!
One feels an ‘invasion of privacy’ clause should precede every visit to the doctor and be signed by him in advance, and in your presence. Why should I tell him everything? He doesn’t need to know that I have a glass of wine every night when he’s mentioned that an occasional glass won’t hurt. So my interpretation may not quite match his but he needn’t know this.
My visit to see the doctor goes something like this...
“What’s your age, Mrs. G?” he asks, pen poised over an official looking form. “Approximate or actual?”
He grins. That’s because he has a sense of humour.
“The nearest to the nearest round figure will do!”
“Okay, then…” So I minus about seven from the actual depressing count of years.
He grins again.
“You do realise that if you need surgery, I will need a birth certificate as proof?”
I tell myself that it will be a cold day in hell before I have surgery under him.
The doctor is used to patients of all categories. His nurse, who is quite familiar with my peculiarities, tells me he always has a little smile on his face once I have left the surgery. And on one occasion, she had asked him why.
“Like all women, she can lie better than any politician,” was his reply.
But to get back to information...
“Just give me your weight, Mrs. G.”
Now I don’t like doing that at the best of times. I lie to myself often enough even when my weighing scales tell me a diet is absolutely needed. I have very selective eyesight when peering at those numbers so clearly marked on the dial.
“Approximate or actual?”
“Actual.”
“I can’t quite recall but...”
He is done with my shillyshallying. There is a line of patients waiting outside.
“Nurse, haven’t I told you to keep the scales in my office?” He doesn’t say it but his expression implies it: “Especially when annoying women are here.”
I remember my weight in a hurry.
“No need for that, doctor. I can give it to you now.” I subtract a stone.
“Hmm!” he says, disbelievingly. “Well now that the scales are here, let’s get the latest.”
Exposed as an unreliable informer, I am demoralised enough to help him fill the rest of that annoying form correctly.
“Honestly,” I say to DB, once I get home, “I’m surprised he didn’t ask me how often I have sex. He asked me everything else.”
“Would you have told him the truth?”
It’s my turn to grin craftily.
“That may be the only lie that he can’t prove,” I say, happily.
DB is nothing if not a bubble pricker.
“It’s also the one question that a doctor will never ask.”