As you know, I move around a lot. When I move, a lot of my stuff gets left behind, because it's usually cheaper to just buy a new one when I get to my new destination. That's true for a lot of things, but not everything. Not things like, say, my uterus. I bring my uterus everywhere with me. I'm also pretty good about bringing my uterus to a doctor once a year for the full workup. I missed a year once (it was that time I had two babies in 18 months) and felt so freaking guilty about it that when I did see a doctor, it was more like seeing a priest for confession.
I was pregnant when I came to Dr. P. and pregnant again, though with a different baby, when I left Dr. P. I was young(er), a bit freaked out to have already miscarried half of my attempts at procreation, and ridiculously enthusiastic/involved/psycho about all things pregnancy. The doctor needed to be perfect, you know? He was not.
Dr. P was famous for withholding information he thought the mother-to-be would find unpleasant. Here's a typical conversation with Dr. P:
All of this means that I have seen gynecologists in the following locations: Florida, Massachusetts, New Orleans, Venezuela, Kenya, Abu Dhabi and Hong Kong. I want to tell you about all of them, but I'm going to focus on the Kenyan gyno because he was the funniest. (One of the Florida ones was the hottest. But THAT is fodder for a different post. A much different post.) Dr. P had the exact same laugh as Dr. Nick Riviera from the Simpsons. He basically WAS Dr. Nick Riviera.
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Dr. P was famous for withholding information he thought the mother-to-be would find unpleasant. Here's a typical conversation with Dr. P:
Me: I'm a little concerned because everyone keeps telling me that I look about four months pregnant. But I'm actually eight months pregnant.
Dr. P: Don't worry. The baby has started growing again.
Me: What the fuck are you talking about?
Dr. P: Well, you remember how for two months the baby didn't show any signs of growth or weight gain at all and we were very concerned? No? Oh, wait. I see here. I wrote "Do not worry mother" in your chart. Well, the baby is fine now.
Dr. P. would ask me to get undressed and hop up on the table (normal procedure) while he was standing there watching (abnormal procedure). He also had a second floor office and left the window open. I could see into the parking lot and, true story, the construction workers could see into his office. It was there that I perfected the "act like this is just a porno" view of gynecological procedure. It has served me well over the years.
When I said, laughingly (but with sweat rolling down my shaking limbs) that I was kind of missing my daily alcohol fix, Dr. P assured me that two glasses of wine a day wouldn't hurt the baby. My pre-pregnancy weight was about a buck five. Two glasses of wine on a 100-lb girl is not a casual event. The effect on my teeny tiny baby? I don't even want to think about it.
When I said, laughingly (but with sweat rolling down my shaking limbs) that I was kind of missing my daily alcohol fix, Dr. P assured me that two glasses of wine a day wouldn't hurt the baby. My pre-pregnancy weight was about a buck five. Two glasses of wine on a 100-lb girl is not a casual event. The effect on my teeny tiny baby? I don't even want to think about it.
Dr. P told me that childbirth would be very easy for me because I had a very "roomy" pelvis. This despite the fact that I weighed about 120 lbs when I delivered an 8 lb baby. After the baby had to go to the NICU because he was caught in my not-so-roomy pelvis for hours and hours of unproductive labor which ended in a vacuum extraction, Dr. P laughed his Dr. Nick Riviera laugh and said, "I guess it wasn't so roomy!" Well, wipe the blood off the wall and paint me red.
Dr. P once sent me home on a Wednesday telling me he was 100% sure I would have the baby by Saturday. Naturally, as a first-timer, I packed the bag, called the grandparents, etc etc. The baby came two and a half weeks later. When I called him out on his prediction, Dr. P said, "Who can tell with these things?"
At 24 weeks, I rolled off my husband one morning to find us both adrift in a sea of blood. The baby and I were both fine, and nobody at the hospital could tell why the hell I was bleeding so profusely. When I saw Dr. P the following week, he reaffirmed that I was fine. I said, "Well, how 'bout that sex thing? Is it, like, a no-go til the baby comes?" He said, "You're fine. Just take it a bit easier on your husband from here on out." Wink wink. Seriously. I think any other doctor would've put me on bed rest. He just advised that we stick to more traditional positions. Needless to say, the threat of maternal hemorrhage made the last half of that pregnancy decidedly longer than the first half.
I had the baby, despite it all. But nine months later, when I found myself pregnant again? I took my business elsewhere.
What about you? Any good gyno gab? (alliteration for the win)
At 24 weeks, I rolled off my husband one morning to find us both adrift in a sea of blood. The baby and I were both fine, and nobody at the hospital could tell why the hell I was bleeding so profusely. When I saw Dr. P the following week, he reaffirmed that I was fine. I said, "Well, how 'bout that sex thing? Is it, like, a no-go til the baby comes?" He said, "You're fine. Just take it a bit easier on your husband from here on out." Wink wink. Seriously. I think any other doctor would've put me on bed rest. He just advised that we stick to more traditional positions. Needless to say, the threat of maternal hemorrhage made the last half of that pregnancy decidedly longer than the first half.
I had the baby, despite it all. But nine months later, when I found myself pregnant again? I took my business elsewhere.
What about you? Any good gyno gab? (alliteration for the win)
The red thing's connected to my wrist watch. Uh oh.
ReplyDeleteWhen you were the coma did you feel your brain being damaged?
Inflammable means flammable? What a country.
Bye, everybody.
Hehe.
Remember the one where he did Homer's bypass? He was watching the tape on how to do it and then realized that he'd taped over it with "People Who Look Like Things?" Awesome.
DeleteNo, but my best friend got the roomy line when she was pregnant. The obygyn said, "You have excellent birthing thighs." He wasn't laughing so hard at the emergency C-Section. Ten pounds ain't so roomy. I'd have totally flipped out at that doctor's office. COMPLETELY GONE BATSO.
ReplyDeleteIt was rumored that one of my former gyn docs had narcolepsy. His fluttering eyelids Backed up my concern that he was going to faceplate, zonked out right in my lady parts!
ReplyDeleteNo funny stories, but I did have a hot gyno when I was preggers with #2. Even the husband agreed he was hot. Sadly, he wasn't on call when I went into labor.
ReplyDeleteMy OB/GYN only owns LSU scrubs and has decorated the entire office in framed and matted LSU write-ups. It's the manliest vagina office ever, which makes me laugh. I gave birth to Luke in 13 minutes with only 6 pushes, after which he cackled like everyone's requisite drunk uncle and congratulated me with a smack on the back of the thigh and a howling "Nice work, girl!" while he stitched my tear. Since my mother so kindly videoed my entire delivery and never mentioned it one day last year when we happened upon it, we have preserved the audio of this scene for all time.
ReplyDelete