Aselin

I have a doctor's appointment in the morning. It's an annual physical and I'm terrified. I have a thing with doctors. Our routine goes EXACTLY like this:

1. I make routine check up appointment.
2. I show up for appointment early, bathed, having followed all abstinence, hygiene and fashion instructions.
3. Doctor gives me the once over, poking, prodding, pinching, peering.
4. I am told to get dressed and then informed of 'additional tests' we will need to run.
5. These tests are always for something really bad. They involve more gouging, pinching, smooshing or imaging.
6. The painful, embarrassing, high-anxiety inducing tests come back - weeks later - and are pronounced totally fine.
7. The doctor then informs me that responsible people will "follow" the initial dubious findings. Which means on some arbitrary but regular basis we will repeat steps two through six again. Just for fun.

I don't know what is wrong with me, but I never fall within the AMA determined averages for normal people. (Most of you could have told me that without additional testing.) I have silly things like high billirubin - which apparently means I eat too many pinto beans. I have freakishly low blood pressure which inevitably means the nurse will check to see if I'm actually alive during the initial blood pressure check. I have cholesterol so low a doctor has actually told me to eat nothing but cheeseburgers with whipped cream. My body weight is not right. My eye color isn't on any chart. My fingernails are too short, my toes are too long - I'm a Shel Silverstein poem waiting to be written.

I've spent a good deal of time wondering if I'm on the bad side of the "Medical Advances" spectrum. It's great we have all these diagnostic abilities, but the reality is I am perfectly healthy until I enter a doctors office - then somehow I develop an odd syndrome, condition or malady - only to be told, "just kidding, you're just fine. But we'll check you again in six months, just to be safe."

I once had an X-ray that came out with a dark shadow on my lung. Panic stricken I was sent for additional testing, only to have the doctor's office realize that the X-ray was taken with faulty film. Yeah, that was a lot of fun.

The last time I saw my "down there doctor" she told me my thyroid wasn't right. I didn't know what to say - I had no adverse thyroid symptoms, and she had run no blood test - it just looked funny. Following up, my thyroid apparently just looks funny. It functions perfectly normal, but now has to see a therapist because it has a complex.

So tomorrow, off we go for round 976 of the above game. I have a dream that one day a doctor will say to me, "Hey weirdo, you're totally normal!"

Here's hoping that day is tomorrow.