AT THE UROLOGIST
I didn’t sleep well the night before my visit to the urologist. I mentioned earlier that when a young woman phoned me on Wednesday that she had offered me a February 6 appointment, and then when I stated that I could be dead by then she hung up on me not even offering for me to take it or leave it. But when I visited my general practitioner doctor the next day he said that he would take care of it and called a day later to say that I had a Monday, January 6, appointment.
By now I was aware of the experiences of my older friends with prostate problems which gave me a range of possible scenarios. One friend diagnosed with prostate cancer had had a botched operation that led to an infection that almost killed him and left him incontinent. Another friend at the same time had had radiation treatment which worked, but two years later he died of leukemia, possibly brought on by radiation. Another friend had had some new form of treatment at the Duke Medical Center which took three months to heal and left him having as much trouble peeing as before. Two other friends had had outpatient surgery that it took two weeks to recover from. Another friend has cheerfully shifted to emptying his bladder four times a day with a catheter. The question that made me sleep badly was wondering which one of these solutions to my prostate problems I would have and when I would be able to travel.
When I got to Asheville Urological Associates they announced that they had been flooded out over the weekend and I would have to go to another building. There a very pleasant younger woman checked me out, but the scanner she was planning to use wouldn’t work, the battery was dead. I might have to be scanned another day. And then the urologist came in, a Physicians Assistant, which is why I got the appointment so soon. She was about 30 in green scrubs and perky and cheerful and friendly. She seemed unimpressed with my symptoms and a new battery and a scan showed that I was emptying my bladder just fine. The scan looked just like the kind pregnant women have and I expected to see a fetus somesaulting in there.
But to test for prostate cancer, a lump on my prostate, could she stick her finger up my butt? I dropped my pants and she felt my prostate but then pronounced that her gloved finger wasn’t long enough and said she would get a man with longer fingers to feel me up, which he did. I offered to let anyone else who wanted to finger me to do so but he said in medical school they could get a room full of people but here there were no other candidates.
So the upshot of all of this was that as far as she could tell I was cancer free and that I didn’t need to use the new medicine, Flowfree, that my general doctor had prescribed. I was free to leave on my trip immediately.
BILLYBABA’S WANDERING 