Me, My Doc, and I

I still haven’t grown out of the creepy, crawly, frightened feeling I got as a kid when I have to go to the neurologist. It doesn’t matter that I am (or that I am supposed to be) a grown-up, rational, well-adjusted person. It doesn’t even matter that my new doctor is a kind, pretty lady about my age. When it comes to going to the doctor, part of me becomes that scared 10-year-old who did not know what was wrong with her, a little girl who had lost control of her body and her brain and was falling out of bed a lot during the night.

When I was a kid my parents were referred to “the best neurologist in Houston,” or so we were told. Upon first meeting my childhood sixth sense told me that this esteemed title he’d received was untrue. Kids get stuff that adults miss because kids are still relatively untarnished and in tune. They’re still able to see horns growing out of heads and little flicks of unsavory tongues out of the sides of mouths. As adults, we acclimate. We become socialized and appropriate. The logical mind takes over so that we no longer rail against creepy doctors or freak out when the next appointment turns up. Kids, still in touch with what truly is don’t have the luxury of dissociation. So we went to see “Dr. P” who tapped on my knees and checked me into the hospital and prescribed little pink pills, telling me I was a-okay even though I knew I wasn’t. But I was ten and scared and didn’t know what else to do.

That was 27 years ago. We did not find the answers then and I still do not have the answers now. I just got back from a neurologist visit today and, as usual, I feel sad and frustrated. Even the best doctors can forget who you are between visits. Even really good ones can ask questions in a tone that make you feel like a kindergartner. Even the most caring ones are still limited, still rushed, still subject to insurance and pharmaceutical companies. In short, doctors are still humans and have crappy days just like their patients do. They still have to wake up every morning, fix breakfast in a hurry, and wipe their arses, after all.

Today I was reminded by my new doctor that, “nothing seems to be working,” to control my seizures. Well, no shit, doc! More tests and additional medications aren’t enticing, either. The best ideas I uncover during my own research is how to care for and tend to my own brain to minimize the long-term damage of having the condition and taking the medications I already take. She does not even go down this road and seems not to hear me when I do. Her philosophy is to stop the seizures or nothing. I like her aggressive style, but if we can’t stop the seizures, I still need to do something– not nothing. I only have this one brain.

When I leave the doctor’s office, I walk away feeling like a deflated balloon that was supposed to get a dose of helium but didn’t. It’s a hopeless sort of feeling to leave with no more answers than I had over 25 years ago. The circular track I’ve walked has worn down into a pretty deep rivulet and I sure would like to climb out and forge a new road. Though I’ve tried different approaches, I still don’t know how to make that climb. I still don’t know what that new road will look like in order to improve my condition. I guess what I do know is that, despite how I feel today,  this issue isn’t everything– it doesn’t overwhelm me entirely– at least not yet and hopefully not ever.

Have doctor stories of your own that you’d like to share? Barring slander, I would like to hear them.