McDreamy is not in quotes in the title of this blog because that's not his real name. It's because for the second follow-up in a row, they had me see some flunky colleague instead. It's very frustrating to expect something to come of these long-awaited appointments only to see someone assessing me for the first time. By assessing, I mean speaking with me for about 6 minutes.
This appointment started with a three hour delay. This may win out as the longest delay I have every had to see a doctor for a scheduled appointment. I took the delay to mean that I was waiting to see him. The office said, "he's running about an hour late" when I checked in.
The new doctors said that McDreamy hadn't been there all day. On the way out of the hospital, we saw him chatting with a nurse in front of the Second Cup. Maybe he got called away to surgery. That was what happened last time.
The guy that I saw was still a neurosurgeon. He was able to read my MRI results and said they were all clear - great news. That is certainly relieving from a surgery perspective. I'm just getting so frustrating with how damn long this recovery is taking. I don't want to be a brain patient anymore.
When Dr. Not-McDreamy (also not the guy I saw last time) came into the room, I said "nice to meet you" (through clenched teeth - I hope it wasn't obvious) so that Jo would know I really wanted to say "who are YOU?" He knew my case well enough to start with a few questions. "Was your aneurysm clipped or coiled?" After two or three more questions, he turns to the computer screen beside him and stares at if for awkwardly long - 4-5 minutes - with the occasional click. He eventually explained that he was interpreting my MRI results (as the report wasn't in yet). 4-5 minutes is a long time for dead silence. I wanted to make game show music. Seriously, Not-McDreamy: you couldn't say, "Just a minute,", or "I'll just look at your MRI" or hold up a finger. At least 4 of my long-awaiting appointment minutes were eaten up with this giant awkward pause.
We asked him questions and got the same old "it's different for everyone", "it depends on what you do for a living" and "when you feel ready".
I can't believe how long it's been since I've seen the real McDreamy. The last thing he said to me was "if your symptoms haven't got away after a year, they might be permanent". He then abruptly left the room, sending in a colleague who told me to stop working and stop exercising. I haven't see her since either. I'm absolutely positive that they were right that I needed more time to heal - a lot more. How much more still remains to be seen. I'm certainly trending up. This is starting to feel like going a hike with that friend that swears it's a 10 km ride, and they swears it's just 2 more km or just around the next corner for the next 25 km. Have you ever had that? Didn't you wish that you had known it was a 40 km ride from the start?
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