Meeting the Doc-in-A-Box

            Over the next few weeks, Mom met with her new clinic doctor, a thirty something transplant whose soft midwestern twang set him apart from the North Carolinians I'd met, most of them in my mother's family. New bits of information we received from him had me feeling optimistic.

            “Your mother’s condition isn’t serious,” he told me confidently.  “The reason she’s been experiencing the bleeding is because of a tumor.”

            I gasped quietly, but he must have heard me anyway, because he hurried to add, “but the tests show that it’s benign.”

            I exhaled. And perspiration that had been forming on my forehead soon evaporated.  This strange doctor was okay. I was starting to like this guy! But before I could uncork any champagne in celebration, I could feel my suspicions growing. Did this stranger who's just met Mom really know what he was talking about? Wasn’t he more accustomed to broken ankles and minor injuries? What did he know about tumors?

As I took off my jacket and slid into my clogs, I began debriefing my husband Tom about the conversation I'd had with the clinic doctor. He sat patiently in the rust colored overstuffed chair in the den as I gave a play-by-play.   He’d already lost both his parents to cancer and tuberculosis before his 35^th birthday and I wanted his take on the situation. I trusted him because he'd had experience with his parents, who had cancer and tuberculosis. Whenever he talked about them, I could tell the experience of loss, more than ten years later, still felt fresh, like open wounds just below the surface. His face became taut and serious, as his eyebrows bunched together.

            “I think you should get a second opinion—maybe Dr. Dowdy?,” Tom suggested. 

            “Good idea,” I said. Dr. Dowdy had been Mom’s cardiologist for four years.  And we were both convinced that Dowdy had single-handedly saved Mom's life.  A massive heart attack had destroyed two-thirds of her heart and almost no one had expected her to survive. Instead, Mom had led a relatively normal life, free of pain.  At least until now.

            When I called him, Dr. Dowdy sounded happy to hear from me and was as gracious as I’d remembered.  A tall, smart, handsome guy with freshly trimmed hair and a smooth Carolinian drawl, Dr. Dowdy had always been kind and forthcoming. And comforting. But when I told him about Mom’s symptoms, his easygoing mood abruptly shifted. 

            “What do I think is going on, given a woman of your mother’s age and condition?” he asked in an ominous-sounding voice.

            “Yes.” 

            “Well, Heather. The truth is, that tumor’s probably not benign,” he answered.  His tone was sober.  “I think we’ve got something to worry about.” 

            Perspiration immediately seeped out of my pores.

            "Then what was that doc-in-a-box talking about? ” Tom said. His deep voice hung heavy with disdain and contempt for the clinic physician whose cheery report had given me hope.

“Dr. Dowdy probably knows your mother’s condition better than anyone,” he added, Glancing over at him, I could see his brain working overtime. He paused before he offered a second suggestion.

            “Why don’t you call Dr. Johnson and ask her whether she’ll take your mother on as a new patient?” he asked.  Dr. Johnson had been my gynecologist for more than ten years.

“We need to get somebody we trust to check out your mother’s condition and find out what to do.”

            I looked at Tom and smiled. Just talking with him calmed me. I shuddered at the thought of life without him. We'd been together for ten years.  Yet, with each passing year, I grew more amazed at my luck in having found him.  He was smart, funny and kind and always willing to talk about the things I felt mattered.

            Often I thought that the most romantic words he’d ever spoken to me weren’t, “I love you, Heather” (although that was certainly high on the list).  Instead, they were what he said when we disagreed:  “Come on, Heather,” he’d coax.  “Let’s talk about it. Tell me what you want.”  The words felt like smooth caresses against my skin. 

Okay, Heather.  Let’s figure out how we can come together on this.  Tell me what you want.

            And now, while Mom’s situation frightened and befuddled me, Tom easily sized up the situation and clarified things in a way I couldn’t manage.  He made sense.  Having Mom in DC, assigned to a doctor we trusted, had the makings of a manageable scenario.  But was Tom really suggesting what I though he was suggesting?  Our family of four now becoming a family of five?  The two of us spent the next 24 hours talking through what it all might mean for all of us. But while we had plenty of questions, there were too few answers.