The doctor lied

Last December I had a bout of stomach distress then ended up at the emergency room. Of course, afterwards my doctor wanted a follow-up visit to go over things and see what we could do going forward. Since I’m a Type 2 diabetic, one of the things she wanted was a A1C test done.

I had to explain to her why drawing blood from me is a Bad Idea(tm). And as it was the holidays, and post Hallowe’en and Thanksgiving, I had to admit that I’d not bee as disciplined as I should have when it came to eating. She decided we’d put off the test for three months so I could have a more accurate test. She said I could have the test done at the local hospital and it’d be a finger stick. OK, I have to do a finger stick every day, I don’t like them, but I can (mostly) tolerate them. I agreed, we set a date, and that was that.

Our church then did a fast during most of January. I got a jump start by a week after having another bout of stomach distress at the end of December. So I gave up all the in-between meal sweets I’d been bad about eating. I did well, laid off the sweets. Not having my weekly Dr. Pepper or hot chocolate was difficult, especially the hot chocolate as this was one of the coldest winters they’ve had in this area in quite some time. There are times when I want to chug a two liter bottle of Dr. Pepper. I don’t, but at times I want to.

I’ve been diligently keeping records of my blood sugars and as of about a month ago started a food diary of what I’m eating. I’m trying to see if there might be some food related cause to my stomach distress episodes. So far no correlations have been found. Although I have to say that while I did the fast my blood sugars dropped closer to the normal range than they have been in quite some time. Yes, I need to stop eating things that are bad for me. But I’m a chocoholic who only eats a small amount every day. Far, far less than the amount I want to eat. Yes, I’ve seen how it accumulates and raises my blood sugar over time. And I now know how long it will take my blood sugar to go back to ‘normal’ levels if I go cold turkey. Chocolate is one of the few small pleasures that makes life worth living for me. I am loathe to give it up.

Anyway, yesterday was the day to go get my A1C checked. It snowed overnight and was still snowing as I had to go out. Fortunately the roads were pretty clear and I didn’t have any trouble getting to the hospital. I checked in, had to do a lot of paperwork, then the nurse came to get me.

While we were walking down the hall to the lab I was talking with the nurse and told her I was glad this was just a finger stick to get my A1C level checked. She turned to me and said “Oh, no, we have to do a blood draw.”

The doctor lied.

I was not happy to say the least. I explained to the nurse why that was a Bad Idea ™. She asked if I wanted to put it off to another day. To my mind, that would just increase the anxiety as I waited for the new date to arrive. I thought it over and decided to go ahead. She called in support and another nurse came to help. The first nurse held down my off hand, while the second nurse did the blood draw. They gave me a rolled up rubber glove to bite down on so I didn’t end up biting either of them. The nurse was very good and got it done fairly quickly. I took a few minutes to calm down and we were done. No phlebotomists were harmed during the blood draw.

I’m going to have words with my doctor when I see her next.

I hope all goes well in your world, my Hordeling.

If you’d like to support my efforts, why not buy me a chocolate chip cookie through my Ko-Fi page? https://ko-fi.com/jhusum