I’m not asking for advice or sympathy, I just need to vent.
So near the beginning of the year, I started dry heaving every morning. I’d get up, go to the bathroom, feed the dogs and then it happened. Nothing ever came up. I was concerned, so I made a gastric appointment, but, of course, that was months away.
In the intervening time, I stopped eating. I didn’t eat for 21 days. I was living off of Gatorade and Ensure. I could drink, but the very thought of eating made me feel sick and actually trying was just not possible.
But then that stopped and I just went back to the heaving and had to wait until June to see the gastric doc. Actually a nurse. She scheduled me for a scope in July, which is when they discovered the ulcer. They put me on Protonix, which is a protein pump inhibitor. It did precisely nothing about the heaving.
So now I’m not eating again. I got an emergency meeting on Monday with the doctor who did the scope and he was totally unconcerned and told me, for a $50 copay mind you, to add Mylanta to my medication and call him in 2 weeks. I can barely choke it down and I’m still heaving and I’m still not eating.
And I can’t even drink Ensure anymore. I did last night and felt so sick. Also I fucking hate Gatorade so much, but I found out that the reason the taste is so strong is to cover the awful, awful taste of whatever the electrolyte mixture is because you can totally taste it with Propel.
My wife did research and loss of appetite is indeed a symptom of gastric ulcers, which may be why the doctor didn’t seem to care, but wow does this suck.
No other appointments with any other gastric doc within a 90 minute drive is available within the next two weeks. Two weeks from Tuesday will be another 21 days. Maybe I’ll go for a new record this time.
Pet theory that a lot of doctors are sociopaths and join the profession for the power and money. Rare to find one that actually cares about people and hasn’t burnt out.
Or they just have become so desensitized to suffering and conditions that they became sociopaths in the process. Point being that it’s either that or getting burned out, but I don’t think the profession attracts that many sociopaths, it just makes them.
I doubt it will help them mentally if they get emotionally involved with every patient and console everyone. One or two dozen patients a day or more than 50 in a hospital will wreck them completely. I think of them like they are car mechanics. No wonder they can easily cut people during surgery without blinking an eye. That professional is not for the weak minded.
I know a few nurses in the neighbourhood and this is basically their survival strategy.
Absolutely. Dentists too. If you were a sadist and wanted a job with the most potential for causing pain, medical professions would be high on the list.
I told an assistant once to warn me before she cleaned a sensitive tooth. That fucker got 10x the attention of every other tooth.
Was having two small cavities filled. The dentist only numbed one of them. When I yelped after she drilled into the live tooth, she rolled her eyes and said she “didn’t think I’d notice”.
When the novocaine wore off, I had been actually butchered. The insides of my cheeks and tongue were cut up, my gums were cut up, and my lips were split open and swollen from being pulled so far open.
It was my first filling. I didn’t know that it wasn’t normal.
Afterwards I switched to a practice for people with dental phobia, and have never looked back! They don’t do anything special except be gentle, explain everything, and most importantly, STOP when you say so. But I have never been let down. I nearly fell asleep during a root canal just a few weeks ago, it was so painless and stress free.