You're sh!##ing me, right doc?

What Now?

This week I get to enjoy the wonderful experience of the yearly physical. I have started making these visits each year for the past 5 or so, you know, when you hit the early to mid-30's, things start to not look like, act like or feel like they used to when you were younger. I myself would probably have been one of those pig-headed guys who only saw the doctor when I had a major problem, like a dangling limb or severe head trauma. But, I have a paranoid mother and a more paranoid wife that would not let me get anything done until I made that annual appointment. Now, in their defense I must say they only pester me because they care about me and would like me to hang around this floating rock as long as possible. Either that or they have conspired together to pester me so much that I will die of annoyance soon and they will be rid of me once and for all. Hmmmmm.

It is in my best interest to get the innards looked at once a year. My family has a history of high cholesterol and prostate cancer (just found out Dad had it a couple of weeks ago). At my appointment a couple of years back I found out my cholesterol level was on the low side of bad, which is very close to the the high side of good so I don't know what the big deal was. I went on medication and dropped that number like it was hot. Then I got on this exercise and health kick and have lost over 20 lbs. since that appointment and have been off the medication since the first of the year, so I am excited to see where my numbers are now.

Here is where my story gets ugly. A week before I get to be fondled and invaded by a dude, I have to get my blood taken for lab work. This has never been an issue in the past so I had no worries as I checked myself in that morning...oh, except for fasting. I was horse eating hungry by the time I got to the office! I was called in, the nice nurse lady took three tubes of blood, she told me that I needed to leave a urine sample before I left, and then she pulled out the white envelope. I have never seen the white envelope before. It must be some kind of survey or something, you know..."How are we doing, did you enjoy your visit, should our nurses be better looking", that kind of thing. The next sentence out of her mouth would change me forever....

"This is your stool smear packet, it's pretty self explanatory but I can go over it with you if you like."

What the what? Are you kidding me? I am sure she could have gone into the gory details for me, but just hearing the words "stool" and "smear" alone made me throw up in my mouth just a little. I grabbed this little while envelope from her, pissed in the cup, and got the hell out of that place. I had the damn thing open before I hit the seat of my car and started reading.

Now, I too could go into the gory details of this little surprise with you, but I imagine you get the gist of it. I got home and set it on the table. My wife looked at it, looked at me and asked "is that a.......", before she could even finish I said yes and left the room. I could hear her laughing as I marched upstairs and crawled into bed. I don't know what it is about this little test that is causing such a problem for me. I have helped raise two human beings and there is not much that grosses me out anymore. This however raised the stakes...big time!

Well, as I right this post I can say I have completed 2/3 of the test (oh yes, there are three parts!) and I am doing OK. I should finish up soon and be ready for the real fun of the actual physical. Three cheers for getting older!!!

PEACE OUT DADS!

Cancer, really?

What Now?

So I am going to take a little blog post break from counting down my top ten WND posts. Last week my Dad had his physical and his level of something I can't remember was a lot higher than his last physical so they wanted to do a prostate biopsy to check for cancer. My Dad's dad has prostate cancer later in his life so the chances were pretty decent that my Dad might have it too. I really didn't give it much thought, not because I don't care about the health of my Dad, but because cancer isn't something that really happened in our family at such a young age (I can now say 60 something is not old since I am close to 40).

So tonight my Mom called to tell me the test came back positive. "What does that mean?" I asked..kind of knowing but not really wanting to. It means there is cancer there. Cancer, really? Talk about your head filling up with more thoughts than you can process. Now, before I get too deep into this I have come to realize that in the world of cancers, prostate cancer is like the minor leagues. And when caught early, like in my Dad's case, it is very treatable. Hell, I even learned that eventually every man will get it if he lives long enough. Now that is crazy shit.

So, before I was calmed by all this my thoughts are about my Dad, his health, me, my health, human mortality...damn, I didn't want to think about this stuff, not now...not ever. Like I mentioned before I have never really had to deal directly with this stuff in my life so I really don't know how to react or what to think. I'm not an idiot, I know that everyone has to deal with death...but I also know it can never be easy.

I am fortunate in my family to have many health care specialists in it. Right away we had names of great doctors for my Dad to call. As my Mom said, he is more concerned with the treatment than the actual cancer at this point. Both my Mom and Wife have made me feel at ease with this news and for this I am so thankful.

Not the most uplifting blog post in the word, but I know it will have a good ending....stay posted, I'm sure I'll be talking about this more down the road.

PEACE OUT DADS...AND KEEP YOUR REGULAR DOCTOR APPOINTMENTS PLEASE!