Caved Too Soon

Story of my life. If it isn’t doctors giving me attitude and inconvenience, it’s my own body playing me false.

You know how your car will make the most horrendous racket, and yank the wheel out of your hands unexpectedly, until the minute you take it to the mechanic, and then it purrs like a kitten and handles as if it just came off the assembly line? Well, my body does that, too.

After three weeks of unremitting pain and an increasingly swollen mass in my left wrist, I caved yesterday and made an appointment to see an orthopedist. I was in so much pain on Wednesday night that I had trouble sleeping, despite ice, Aleve, and a rigid brace to keep the wrist from bending. So, I thought, I’ll give in. I take the dang thing to the doctor and get it seen to.

So this morning, I head to OrthoMemphis. I like this practise … it’s the second time I’ve used them, and even though they are ginormous and you’d expect all kinds of problems, they are really quite efficient. I downloaded the new patient forms (last time I went was for my son, not for me) so I could fill them out ahead of time. Always nicer than trying to write on a clipboard balanced on my knee. I arrived at 0730, for my 0745 appointment. Signed in, handed in the paperwork and handed over my insurance card and driver’s license. When the assistant had copied them, she handed them back and told me that the doctors would begin seeing patients at 0800, so I would have just a few minutes wait.

At 0800 on the dot, I was called back to a waiting room. I was not asked to undress, so there was no unpleasantness with paper “clothes,” thank Heaven. At 0805, a very attractive young man in a white coat came in — it’s nicer when they are easy to look at — listened to my history, asked some questions, examined my wrist, and explained the options. He noticed that I winced a few times when he was manipulating my wrist, so he asked — asked,  mind you — if he could take a few x-rays to make sure that there was no fracture of the small wrist bones. There wasn’t.

Unfortunately, the swelling that I have battled for three weeks decided to subside last night. Three weeks of gentle massage and manipulation, rigid braces, anti-inflammatory pills, ice packs, and Epsom salts soaks, all to no avail until I decide to take it to the doctor. And then it shrinks, overnight,  to the point that the doctor doesn’t think that even aspiration and a cortisone shot would be a wise treatment at this point.

So. No surgery for now, but he wants to see it immediately the next time the swelling appears. Based on the size and shape I described to him, he said that surgery was probably my best bet. For now, he’s applied a stiff compression bandage which I’m to wear for three weeks. I’m to sleep in the rigid brace (over the bandage), and continue to ice and Aleve for the pain, which is subsiding as the swelling goes down.

I am relieved by the temporary reprieve from surgery. But it’s only that. Temporary. If it follows its usual course, I’ll be back in his office in eight to ten weeks — only this time I’m calling him the minute the swelling rears its ugly head. Because it’s rather annoying to have finally screwed up my courage to seek a doctor’s advice, only to have my body play me false. Annoying … but not really unusual.

Tags: doctors, Family Life, medical issues, pain, True Stories