I have a weird relationship with my doctors. They try to keep me alive, and I lie to them every six months, so they’ll refill my prescriptions. Avoid going to the doctor’s office is my mantra.
Recently, my doctor’s office screwed up my blood work, so I had to return and give another sample. I thought I was good the week before: I gave blood and my pressure was a respectable one-forty over eighty. I was good to go for the next six months (at least, I thought so).
The morning of my return, my pressure was even better, so walked in the office with all the confidence in the world.
As I paced the small room, the doctor suggested I see a cardiologist. Back out to the waiting room, I went. After ten minutes of watching “The Property Brothers” on The Home and Garden Network (do doctors get a discount on this channel? The same show was on every time I went to my eye doctor last year.), I was about to leave when the nurse handed me a sheet of paper. If I hurried, I could make a two o’clock appointment.
After rushing to the given address, I found myself in another waiting room; I could feel the blood pumping in my skull. Two more pressure readings, two more record-setting numbers. They ushered me to another room and told me the doctor would be in soon.
After a time, a small man came in, wearing a suit vest but no jacket. He came over, patted me on the shoulder, and asked me, in a very soothing voice, what was wrong. As we spoke, he’d nod his head, and repeat, “You’ll be fine.”
“Let’s sit over here,” he said, guiding me to a small desk and chair, his hand on my elbow. “No, no,” we changed direction and glided across the room to another chair. “This is better,” he said, as he put the dreaded cuff around my arm. “You’ll be fine.” The numbers cleared the two-hundred mark; a personal best.
Then, with the cuff inflated, he pushed hard at the bend of my elbow, his finger poking, as he looked for something. Then, he said, “One-forty-over-eighty. You’ll be fine.”
I don’t know if it was true, or if he just said it to reduce my anxiety, but it worked. I felt better.
But we were far from done. The doctor ordered me to return Thursday for an ultrasound of my heart.
“Oh,” I said, “so we’ll finally find out if my heart is a boy or a girl.” (I’m sure health care professionals enjoy a good sense of humor while trying to save a person’s life.)
It turned out that I had to wear a blood pressure monitor for the next twenty-four hours. What form of hell was this? The one thing I hated most about going to the doctor, now, affixed itself to my arm and would come to life every fifteen minutes for the next twenty-four hours. The nurse put the cuff on my left arm, draped the hose around the back of my neck, and I clipped the monitor to my belt.
Anyone who has ever had their blood pressure taken knows the longer the cuff inflates, the higher the number and the tighter the grip on your arm. For the first few hours, every time the monitor went off, my left arm turned purple, as the cuff cut off my circulation. Eventually, I calmed down enough so the monitor, hopefully, took a decent reading. I even started to ignore the periodic handshake to my bicep.
The cuff and monitor were covered by my shirt; no one would know I wore it unless I told them. Later that afternoon, when I stepped into the men’s room, the cuff decided–at that moment–to come alive. Luckily, I didn’t have to explain the low-level hum that was emanating from my pants.
Did Not Plan Ahead
I went home that night, took off the shirt but couldn’t remove my undershirt without disconnecting monitor. That was fine. I unhooked the device from my belt, then realized “Where the hell am I going to put it?” I had a running belt/waist pack from my days as a marathoner (Kidding, I wouldn’t need this if I ran marathons). Short of duct-taping this thing to my stomach, I had no other choice. I removed the belt from my pants, fastened it around my waist, and clipped the device back into place.
Quite the fashion statement: boxer-briefs, t-shirt, white socks, blood pressure monitor, and black dress belt around my waist. If I died that night in my sleep, the talk of the funeral would most likely be ‘How did he take his pants off without removing his belt?’
An awkward night’s sleep lay in wait, as I tried not to roll over on the monitor or jump each time the cuff took a deep breath in the middle of the night.
Twenty-four hours–to the minute–I was back in the doctor’s office. I disconnected the monitor and handed it over to the receptionist.
That was four days ago, and I have not heard back from the cardiologist about the results. That leads me to make two conclusions: The results are good and there are no further concerns, or they think I died. Either way, no news is good news. Right?
Right?
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