The Why

So I think I know why. Why I feel like I’ve been put through the wringer. Why I’ve let myself start a little pity party with me as the guest of honor. I needed to get to today and realize that in the scope of the world, my problems are miniscule.

Today I went to the OB/GYN. I had an ultrasound. All good news. Then I proceeded to wait in the waiting room for over an hour while my doctor’s new nurse figured out which end is up and didn’t realize that a patient who has an appointment for an ultrasound and a visit with the doctor still needs to see the doctor when the ultrasound is over. This was after OBB had two crying fits, I made two visits to the desk to “check” on my progress in their queue, and I had watched at least 20 other people flit in and then be ushered out of the waiting room into exam rooms.

I followed that 2-hour odyssey up with lunch in the car for both of us, courtesy of the nearest drive through and then transferred a sleeping OBB into his stroller to head into the hospital for x-rays. More waiting rooms, more people who weren’t completely on board with how things were supposed to be going in my day. When the x-ray techs started taking x-rays of his left leg, I interrupted to say “No, it’s his right.” “Oh, we’re gonna have to call the doctor’s office on that.” 20 minutes later, they decided to take x-rays of both.

All through the x-rays, OBB was very quiet and compliant until they turned him on his right side. Then he howled. The tech said she could tell from looking at how he was holding his right foot out that it was his hip that was bothering him. So the tech and I removed his diaper and pressed on his back a little where his leg meets his trunk – he screeched. All I could think was “what am I going to do with a 2 year old with a broken hip?” But thankfully, all the x-rays came out clean. “I think he pulled or tore something” the tech told me after the x-rays had been reviewed. “You can’t really do anything for it…it will just heal on its own.” So I left the hospital sometime around 4 p.m. and headed home.

Now for the why. As I was waiting for the doctor to read OBB’s x-rays – my fifth time in a waiting room that day – this older man stands up from across the room, walks over and sits down near us. He starts talking to me and telling me his life story. And every time I think it couldn’t possibly get worse, it gets worse.

He starts by telling me he’s there because his son is having a procedure. His son is 30 and was born with spina bifida. He had a kidney stone last week that they had to remove. Then three days later, he had to have his gallbladder taken out. And now he has an abscess that they had to insert a drain for, but because of the shunt in his brain leading to his stomach, they have to do it in radiology so they can see what they’re doing. He talked about spending his life taking care of his son and his wife, until she passed a few years ago. Every time he would tell me the next sad thing that had happened to him, he would follow it up with “but I am so blessed”. “I’ve found that you just have to keep going and God will take care of everything.”

He told me about his career as a police officer and how he was hit by a truck while doing traffic duty. He was thrown 29 feet in the air and had to have back surgery afterward. He told me how the City has stopped paying for insurance for its retirees and how he’s not sure how he’ll continue to afford caring for his son. He told me how his son spent the first 6 months of his life in the hospital and how you couldn’t get children on Medicaid back then – not until they were 18 – so while the doctor’s bills got paid, the hospital bills didn’t.

All of this made me feel like a schmuck. Here I was, bemoaning the events of my day in my head to myself, when this guy was dealing with things on a scale I hadn’t even thought about. I felt like standing up in the waiting room, raising my hands up and yelling “Ok! I get it!” Here was a guy who was going through trials far worse than mine and he was managing to be pleasant and thankful and feel blessed. The least I could do is feel the same way in my situation. In all situations.

So there you go. My divine revelation came in the radiology waiting room. Hopefully, I won’t have to endure quite so many plagues next time for God to get His point across.