Out of Warranty

“Since you're over forty, we need to run some tests.”

In case you are wondering, the Caucasian, male kidney (for all I know, it could be all kidneys, I hate to make broad sweeping statements.) is only good for forty years. After that, you need tests before you can do anything.

I found this out recently. Over the past two weeks, my neck and shoulder have been “twitchy”. This is my medical term meaning it hurts enough to remember, but not enough to actually do anything about. Well, yesterday, that “twitchy” went into full blown “is amputation an option.”

Now, I've gone through four knee operations (not the wimpy arthroscope stuff either. The real chisel and hammer, bone shards flying kind.), a fractured toe (definitely not gout, so don't even think it.) and child birth. (Yeah, I know my wife “had” the baby, but I suffered through the labor. (You might want to grab another cup of coffee, this is going to be a long side track.) I have a pretty cool bone disease. I get extra growths throughout my body. At one time, I had one on the middle finger of my left hand. When people would ask why four knee operations, I'd either make up a story about land mines and guiding the insurgents through the mountains of Afghanistan, or sometimes tell them the truth. Through my twenties and thirties, I got immense pleasure, especially at work, showing what the disease did. I could legally and morally give anyone the middle finger.

I lost this passive/aggressive outlet for my deep-seated frustrations when my daughter was born. My wife somehow mis-planned the epidural and didn't have it in place at the third month. So, when we got to the hospital and the anesthesiologist was overbooked, we resorted to the age-old “squeeze the husband's hand” method of pain relief. Well, after the blessed event (she let go of my hand) I saw several things. The growth on my middle finger was gone. My wedding ring was a wedding oval. Oh, and I had a beautiful, wrinkle-covered daughter. That's, from what I've heard from unreliable third parties, when I passed out the first time.)

So, I'm no stranger to pain. Today, it was bad enough for a trip to the doctor. After an initial examination, it was determined that an x-ray was in order. A few doses of radiation and it was back to my room to wait for the Dr. to read the film and come back. At this point, I just wanted something to ease the pain until I could see my real Dr for a long term solution. A few minutes later, the emergency room Dr did just that. “Do you smoke?”

“Not really, an occasional cigar.”

“The x-rays show a spot on your lung. You're young and healthy, so I'm not that worried about it, but want to get another angle on the x-ray.”

While the pain in my shoulder didn't stop, I wasn't really noticing it any more. The doctor was rather attractive and thought I was young. Then the words “spot”, “lung” and “on” seeped through. A young doctorette though I was young and healthy even with a spot on my lung. I still had it.

I went back for more x-rays and then back to the room to wait for the young, cute doctor. That's when I found out there's a warranty on the adult male kidney. And I was no longer young and healthy. A CT scan was ordered because the second set of x-rays were inconclusive. My middle-aged kidneys needed to be tested to see if they could handle the dye used in the CT scan.

There is a bit of good news though... In order to get a more accurate x-ray so they could conclusively say they weren't sure what the spot on my lung was, the radiologist had me grab my left elbow and attempt to place it behind my right ear. While that was physically impossible, it did move whatever was “twitchy” back to where it should be.

Now that the immediate pain was gone, I was able concentrate on what the doctorette had said... I was no longer young.