Hi
First of all I wish to apologize to the readers for the problems I have had loading this new posting. No matter what I have tried it has not formatted as it should and my patience has run out. So I hope you can read it as it is.
I hope to get this problem fixed before the next posting.

Cheers Cynthia.


Letter
From The Other Side; From Cynthia. ‘Hoy! I’m Down Here.’

Dear Del,
Aren’t doctors
an annoyingly pompous group sometimes?
Have you ever
been told by someone about the same age as one of your grandchildren that it
might be time to begin using a walking stick? Last week when I was adding yet
more money to my doctor’s slush fund toward her annual cruise around the Great Barrier Reef, she made that suggestion to me.

I was not
having a good day pain-wise and during days like that the brakes which should
work between my brain and my tongue don’t always function very efficiently so
before I could stop them the words of advice of where the said walking stick
would be perhaps more usefully be employed were out of my mouth.
She did look
a little taken aback, but with a wry smile suggested I would probably decide
for myself when to take my mother’s stick from the stand where I have kept it
since she died.
I had another
occasion during one of my recent sojourns in the hospital to become an irritant
in the doctor’s day.
As he and the
nurse stood over me chatting about my condition and what might be done about
it, some of the stored memories of my long days in hospital as a child must
have been dredged up and I felt I had reverted to the way I felt then. They
ignored me during this discussion as if I was incapable of hearing or
understanding anything such important people may say.
I had once more been transformed into a
‘condition’, not a person.
I suppose I
was feeling vulnerable while sitting up in a bed in my night wear, which these
days is not of the slinky and seductive kind but more closely follows the warm,
comfortable and modest mode. My hair was all mussed up, no make-up on and I
know I looked pale and elderly rather than interesting as women ‘of a certain
age’ are bound to become.
However, since those childhood days of illness
when I lay motionless in my bed while the grown-ups chatted over my body, I
have found my voice and lost the reverence toward the healing community my
parent’s generation seemed to hold and tried to instil in me. In fact my mother
was so impressed by doctors it wouldn’t have surprised me if she had
genuflected to them when they entered our home. She rather reflected the
fawning mannerisms of Basil Fawlty when a couple who were doctors graced the
guest list at his incredibly dysfunctional hotel.
I think it
helped me be more of a realist by going to school with two girls who became
doctors. They always passed their exams brilliantly but didn’t appear to be
able to retain a great deal of what they had learned for any length if time. I
know to this day if ever I walked into a surgery with one of them seated behind
the desk I would probably say ‘Hello’ and pretend I had just popped in for a
chat even if I did have to pay for the privilege.
Anyway, as I
was telling you these doctors were enjoying a great old discussion across my
prone body and the old feeling of being treated as a deaf and stupid nonentity
returned.
I raised my
hand as high as I could and said loudly; ‘Hoy! If you are going to talk about
me have the grace to at least acknowledge you know I’m here.’
There were a
few, ‘Oh,.. ers, yes sorry Cynthia.’ and we became comrades again.
Years ago I
used to volunteer at a school for children with disabilities and when we took
the pupils on an outing or just to enjoy a morning tea in the local mall we
were always aware of the occasional person who would make a quick involuntary
step back when the doors of the elevators opened to reveal the wheelchair bound
bodies and disfigured limbs. Then there were those who would shift away to
other tables because some of the older children handled their food like
toddlers, spreading it on themselves, their clothes and quite a lot of it on
the floor. I suppose to people who don’t live with it every day it can be
confronting.
Sometimes to
ours and the children’s pain we were told by an obnoxious individual that we
should not have had them in the shopping area or even out in public.
Why I bring
this up is that the same thing begins to happen to older bodies and the young
and healthy find it hard to witness. They often don’t realize how difficult it
is for the elderly people themselves to experience these changes, because
inside they still feel the same. In fact I tend to think that the character
inside is often an improved version of the one that was there when they were
young and healthy.
The medical
profession should be the one section of the community which should have the
training and the capacity to allow older people the respect and dignity they
deserve.
To this I add
that for me, and I’m sure many others, I resent the hospital cost cutting habit
of filling a ward’s beds with both male and female patients.
Flinging ones
legs out from the height of a hospital bed and padding about in one of those
gowns which have the opening down the back or for a gentleman to have his
pyjamas fall around his ankles and not be able to bend to pick them up is
demeaning.
Even during
the swinging sixties we were allowed the privacy of having the sexes separated.
I have heard both men and women say how confronting and embarrassing it can be.
What has
happened to our country? Years ago when
the population was smaller we were able to afford the first class medical care
of the day and have hospitals that contained happy and well contented staff
with the best of training? Where did the money and the caring priorities for
the patient begin to flow to?
Ooh I am
going to be a pain in the neck if ever I have to be cared for permanently. I’ve
already told my family I don’t want them to do it, because I want the capacity
to sack someone if I’m not happy with the treatment. I have already dispensed
with one doctor’s ministrations, or perhaps I should say lack of patient care.
I’ve also been known to discharge myself from a hospital after sitting in a bed
for five days without having a doctor come near me. That was a very large crack
I must have fallen through and no one knew why.
My present
doctor was quite surprised when I presented him with copies of all my latest
tests and discharge notes that I had requested through freedom of information.
I think he should become used to it because there will be many more in years to
come as people realize they have the right to access their own records.
So my advice
is to remember the old saying about the squeaky door getting the attention.
Squeak up for yourself.
Cheers
Cynthia.