I’ve talked to some of you about this, but I wanted to catch up the rest of the Internet—because they’ve been waiting for me to update my blog so they could have the low-down on my medical particulars, right?
Just before Cisco Live I got one of those dreaded summer colds. You know the ones I’m talking about. It’s hot outside and you’re sniffling like it’s the middle of winter. I wouldn’t have been so worried, but this one came with a side of laryngitis. Ordinarily that wouldn’t have been a big deal either but I was working a booth for Sigma Solutions. So, I needed a plan.
I broke down and called the doctor’s office. “We have an appointment next week at 11am.” Next week? What about today? They were able to make some room so I headed in expecting to sit there for a while. I brought my Kindle and got lost in some novel.
“Steven Klassen?”
The first stop was the scale, my favorite. I stepped up, waited for the numbers to stop moving, and shrugged off the disapproving look from the nurse as she jotted down the verdict. From there it was the usual routine. Temperature, normal. Blood pressure, 145/75.
“Your blood pressure is too high.”
No kidding. I’ve got laryngitis and I’m going to a convention where I’ll either be 2 days through 5-day antibiotic or I’ll be sucking it up and trying to talk through large quantities of Chloraseptic®. So the nurse leaves again and I drop back into my book. Before I know it the nurse practitioner arrives. With this clinic it’s a crap shoot whether you’ll get the MD or the LNP.
She asked me the usual probative questions about blood pressure – do you smoke? do you drink? do you do drugs? do you exercise? Everything was going great until she asked me the last time I’d had blood work done.
“Mmm, I’m 32 so the last time I would have been forced to part with my blood would have been, what, 14+ years ago?”
I was informed that she would give me a Z-pack for my cold but that I was going to have to give blood. “Sure, no problem,” I said. I figured that she’d send me to a lab somewhere and I’d have at least one more chance to back out. Nope, she walks me two doors down where there’s a phlebotomist pulling on plastic gloves.
Now, I have a problem with needles. When Ivy had to go to the emergency room for her pancreas pain and they pulled out the needle I nearly passed out in the chair behind the ER nurse. It was a real bad situation. I didn’t expect that this time would be much better and my body didn’t disappoint.
I sat down, rolled up my sleeve and offered the blood-sucker my veins. I thought maybe if I just kept talking and didn’t look that way I’d be alright. I was sadly mistaken. I don’t need to see the needle. I just need to know that one’s involved in my particular situation and that’s enough to send my stomach into a bad bad place. I thought I’d almost made it through when I hear “oops, the vein rolled on me – gonna have to try again.”
“Bathroom, now.”
I’ll spare you the gory details, but let’s just say by the time I emerged from the facilities I was green around the gills and so pale I was see-through. The old phlebotomist was gone and my original nurse was there. A bait-and-switch! These guys are sneaky.
“We’re going to get that blood out of ya, Mr. Klassen.”
We headed back to the exam room and I laid down. I don’t even want to think about what happened next, but she got what she was after. I left the office feeling grateful to the nurse, angry with the LNP, and unhappy in general. I didn’t like being ambushed like that.
I did my work at Cisco Live and came back. I called the doctor’s office. “Hi there, I’m back. Do you have the results of my blood work?”
“Yes, but there were some strange things we need to talk to you about. You should come in.”
“Strange? What does that mean, strange?”
“Oh, nothing serious.”
Okay, that’s just not cool. I head back into the doctor’s office again and do some more waiting. The nurse takes my temperature and blood pressure. The latter was 150/75 (or something like that – higher systolic than before).
“Your blood pressure is too high.”
Yeah, and you told me to come in because of some strange in my blood work. Why don’t you try my blood pressure when I’m happy or at least not staring down the barrel of a sales gig with laryngitis or getting the results of “strange” blood work.
The punch line? Vitamin D3 deficient, overweight, and two bad blood pressure readings.
I ordered an Omron Wrist Blood Pressure Monitor that stores my readings and uploads them to my laptop. Since I started tracking it I haven’t had but a couple readings over 120/70*. The vitamin D3 I’m raising up a bit with 5000 IUs of these drops from Vitamin Shoppe. They taste terrible, but if it’ll even things out, I’m all for it.
*The 143/86 on the 12th was a customer’s reading. They wanted to try my BP cuff and I hadn’t learned how to turn off automatic saving yet. =)
