I had my MRI follow-up appointment today, to see if I had a stress fracture in my foot. I was pretty confident that everything was fine because the pain was lessening every day and people at work were commenting on the fact that my limp was gone. Stopped and took my bp in the waiting room - 122/65. Yipee! The body is doing well today!
The nurse took me to the exam room and said that Dr. P. was out of town and Dr. D. would see me - “he’s the real kingpin around here - the Head of the Department - he really knows his stuff and you’re lucky to see him”.
Dr. D. soon then appeared and asked how I was doing, and I told him "much better”. He said, “Well, that’s good, but we found two stress fractures in your foot and we’ll have to wait and see. This is not uncommon; just wear good shoes, don’t go barefoot, no running or jumping and you should be fine. You can walk as much as you want."
I started crying and then sobbing at a grand level. I muttered, "I've been through too much and can't take any more - the last 'wait and see' situation was with my left eye, and ten days later I had a fully detached retina”.
He looked startled and annoyed. He slammed a box of Kleenex on my lap, and said “Now you listen here, missy - I’ve been practicing orthopedics for 30 years and have horror stories about diabetes and lower limbs that would give you nightmares. You were extremely lucky - your ankle healed without incident. Look - you had 49 staples on the outerside and 35 on the inner and you hardly have a noticeable scar. And now you’re hysterical about a non-eventful stress fracture - you’ve gotta get thing in perspective or you’ll make yourself crazy”.
By then I was down to a sniffle. He stood up and said “And oh, by the way - the best thing you can do at this point is lose about 20 pounds - even 10 would take a lot of stress off your bones.”
He left and a moment later the nurse came in and handed me a piece of paper. “Dr. D. said to give you his pager number and if you have any concerns, leave a message and he will personally call you back. "
The magic of this life is that the messages are always out there for us - we just need to be listening.
Build on the Victories. MN
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2 comments:
Your post made me smile. It is so typical of how we are, dealing with event after event in this diabetes thing, so that a little setback can send us into tears. (I do that a lot.)
What a doctor! I hope you can handle his kick-in-the-pants info along with his pat-on-the-back. How cool that he gave you his pager info. Hang in there with the stress fractures. Foot pain is a b****.
This post brought tears-- and a smile.
Sometimes I guess you just need someone to pull you out of the depths-- rather roughly.
MN-
Just discovered your blog recently via many insightful comments you've left elsewhere.
My son has had type 1 just shy of two years-- though it feels like a lot longer...
I'll add a link to your blog on my site this morning.
And (a belated) welcome to the Blogosphere!
Sandra
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