Calling Doctor Gray

Ever since I went home for Thanksgiving three weeks ago, my mom has been nagging me about calling Dr. Gray, my orthopedic surgeon, to make an appointment for my six-month follow-up to the surgery consultation I had back in September. He is only in San Francisco for one day of the week, so appointments go quickly.

Because I try not to think about the current state of my spine and what is to come for it in the following months, calling the receptionist of the man who could very well be cutting me open on an operating table and welding my spine together this coming summer is not exactly on the top of my list of priorities. Logically, that makes no sense whatsoever, but in my mind, "the call" resulting in the set-up of yet another follow-up moves me another step closer to the operating table and the week-long stay in a hospital room (assuming all goes well during the operation, of course), and as calm as I have gotten about the situation after freaking the fuck out this summer, I just can't deal with that symbolic push forward right now.

Since I put off calling my doctor for months last summer (yes, months), I had trouble getting an appointment before move-in day and the receptionist definitely had to pull some strings to fit me into his September schedule. My mom freaked out about how much I procrastinated and how close I came to missing my surgery consultation with Dr. Gray because of it, so she has been calling me almost daily to nag, nag, nag, and nag some more about calling to make an appointment for a follow-up during my week home for Spring Break in March.

"How hard is it to pick up the phone and CALL THE DOCTOR?!" My mom exclaimed out of frustration after I told her I still hadn't called on the eleventh nag-call she made to me during her lunch break.

It's pretty damn hard when the consequences of "the call" - another visit to the radiology department of the hospital to get X-rays done where the technicians who probably recognize me by face (if not solely by the grotesque curvature in my spine that they have seen progress so rapidly over the last few years) will undoubtedly gather around my latest batch X-rays to cluck worrisomely while they shake their heads and ask my mother about the doctor's latest prognosis, another trip to the orthopedic surgeon's office in CPMC where I will watch him measure the new degrees of curvature in my spine and shake his head as he approaches me to further discuss my surgery options in his somber voice, another tense silence that will suffocate us on the car ride home from the doctor's office, another round of curl-up-in-a-ball (which might actually be bad for my spine, now that I think about it) and cry-my-eyes-out breakdowns following the revelation of a new batch of not-so-great information by my doctor, and moving yet another step closer to packing my bags for that week-long hospital stay - are all situations that I would very much prefer not to voluntarily subjugate myself to during my one "week of relaxation" between Winter and Spring quarters.

But the stakes on this next appointment were much higher.

"YOU WON'T HAVE INSURANCE NEXT YEAR. HOW WILL WE PAY FOR THE OPERATION IF YOU DON'T CALL TO GET AN APPOINTMENT WITH YOUR DOCTOR THIS INSTANT?!" My mother yelled at me during her latest nag-call.

No insurance and medical bills from a major invasive surgery plus (at least) a week-long stay in the hospital? Definitely not pleasant to think about.

So I called.

And I made the appointment.

The receptionist is sending the requisition for a new batch of X-rays to my house later this week.

After thinking about it constantly last summer, I think I have come to terms with the possibility of having the back surgery done - it is no longer a question of whether I should or should not go through with it. If the doctor does not have good news about some miraculous realignment of the forty-four fucking degree curve on the bottom of my spine that is the candidate for the operation on my next visit and continues to recommend surgery as a good option for me, I think I am going to agree to do it.

I may be out of that agonizing state of limbo, but that doesn't mean I am any less scared out of my wits about what is to come.