My internal medicine physician, Bart, up and retired after 30+ years of taking care of me. I hated to see him go, since he understood all my quirks, anxieties, and he managed to stay on my case enough to take care of my diet and exercise and have some degree of good health.
He told me it was time for me to move to a “geriatric doctor.” That sounded ominous.
He suggested Sara….a new addition to their group with a specialty in geriatric medicine.
I was now an “elderly” patient. Next stop….a fancy “retirement home.” Or, worse yet, what we used to refer to as “The Old Men’s Home” if I couldn’t cough up thousands of dollars to move to one of the “boutique” facilities.
A large, stuffed envelope arrived in the mail containing enough pages to represent a small novel. It took me nearly an hour to complete the forms that were needed to help Dr. Sara in her initial evaluation of me.
The day of my appointment arrived and I was ushered to a separate waiting area of the clinic, separate from the one I normally used. This room was filled with apparent “geriatric” patients. I guess they wanted to keep us away from the general population in case our waiting time was too long and we started screaming about the inconvenience.
(You know how old people are when they have to wait!)
Surprisingly, I was called back quickly, had blood work drawn, and cooled my jets for a few minutes.
Quick knock at the door and in walks Dr. Sara. We took a few minutes to do introductions and then she scooted back in her chair, looked at me, and said---“tell me about you and your life.”
Big mistake.
“How long do we have,” I asked.
“Oh, don’t worry….at least 45 minutes.”
I handed her a copy of my most recent book, “From Loading Dock To President…The Near Failure Of A Mississippi Businessman.” and told her “it’s all in the book!”
We chatted about some of my history and then I shared with her my current assessment of my life.
“I feel like I am being chased by a big, green monster…he has a lot of pockets and in some of the pockets are things called Parkinsons, breast cancer, prostate cancer, melanoma, dementia, Alzheimer’s, and lung cancer.”
I continued with her…”I have close friends who are fighting these right now….most of them are my age.” I shared with her that I was 74 years and I was running desperately to stay ahead of the monster. I was OK for now, but one day he will catch me.
But I am not ready for that!
Dr. Sara thought that was a good way to put it.
Then, we got off on the required evaluation form that the patient and spouse must fill out with questions about general behavior, emotions, and cognitive skills.
I was doing great….no issues…until I got to the question…”does the patient sometimes make irrational decisions that result in inappropriate actions?”
I pulled out my phone and showed Dr. Sara a picture that was taken of me at a Mississippi State football game last season with the guys in the end zone that are bare chested and painted up in maroon. I got caught up in the moment, yanked off my shirt when the student section began cheering, and joined in a pose.
Suddenly, the students screamed out…”turn around…the ESPN camera is on y’all.” So, we were projected on the huge jumbotron screens, showing off in front of 60,000 fans and a national television audience, which included my pastor at First Baptist-Jackson, Chip Stevens.
(I am a former Chairman of Deacons at FBCJ and was nearly excommunicated at the next Deacon’s meeting.)
At this point I asked Dr. Sara…”does this qualify for an irrational decision that results in an inappropriate action?”.
(You should know that Dr. Sara is an Ole Miss graduate, as well as UMMC Medical School, so she probably thought it was inappropriate for me to have been at the State game to begin with.)
My lab work was good, my mental acuity was solid and save for needing to lose more than the 14 pounds I had done this year, I was declared sane and in relatively good shape for a 74-year-old fat boy.
St. Catherine’s Village or The Orchard are just going to have to wait.
Kendall Smith is a Northsider.
