The doctors in New Jersey are going on strike on February 3. I am not making this up. I am scheduled to have minor surgery on February 3. Sucks to be me . Here's the strike deal: they are staging a work slowdown to protest the rising cost of malpractice insurance, which is direct result of malpractice victims being given unbelievably huge awards by juries. Frankly, I'm on both sides here. Victims should be compensated. People should not sue doctors without good cause. Doctors who haven't ever even been involved in malpractice should not have to pay -- in some cases -- an insurance premium of $130,000 per year just so that can work .
F-- all that. It's one day, it's one little eyelid. Can't the doctor just fix the damn thing first thing in the morning and then go on strike?
A bit of an explanation. When they took out the brain tumor eleven years ago, the facial nerve on my right side was left, well, let's say, injured. Not by the surgery, but by the tumor that was in there before. It had been pressing against the facial nerve. So after the surgery, I could only smile with one side of my mouth, and only raise one eyebrow, which is something I always thought was cool anyway. This was not terribly obvious to anyone who looked at me. (Although I was in the hospital with my head all bandaged, so I looked like shit anyway.) The big issue was that my right eyelid didn�t blink, at least not as much as it should have. If you live like that for very long, they end up having to take out your eyeball, since it doesn�t keep re-moisturizing itself with tears. So, two days after the tumor went, a very unpleasant and not very good ophthalmologist stitched part of my right eye closed, no more than about a quarter inch, in from the outer edge .
I looked relatively okay after all the surgery and all the swelling went down and I got off the prednisone. Oh wait, the eye thing looked scary and awful and sometimes little children got creeped out by it. Having my picture taken for the school yearbook every year was an ordeal
Then, about six years ago, I was sent to a WONDERFUL WONDERFUL doctor who fixed where my eye was sewn shut and made it look normal, and he put a very small piece of gold into my eyelid. It�s not supposed to show, just add enough weight so that I can close my own eye. Is that cool, or what?
But the weight slipped, and I can see the corner of the weight pressing out against my eyelid skin, just a little. No one else can see it unless I point it out (which, of course, I do. All the time.) I went back and he said he could fix it whenever I want, no problem
The recuperation takes a week or two out of work afterwards because I can�t read until all the swelling goes down. Last time, I had it done the first day of summer vacation, but not giving up another vacation for this. That�s what sick days are for .
So I waited for two years, because what kind of fun would it be to be home sick for two weeks watching any movies I want and eating macaroni and cheese all day if Younger Daughter (aka K) was there with me the whole time? Ah, yes, she was home from school for a year and a half with that Chronic Fatigue thing. This was going to be my operation, dammit, and I wanted to enjoy it! I didn�t want to spend all day every day doing things for her, watching what she wanted on TV!
Now she�s at school, and I�ll have the house all to myself. I waited until winter, a slow time of year at school, not missing too much. When I went back to the doctor, he said that because a lot of my nerve function is returning, he won�t be fixing the position of the gold weight, he�s taking it out! Also very cool .
Except now he going on strike, or whatever it is they�re doing. And since I�ve already scheduled a dozen other things around this February 3 surgery, I have no idea what�s going on. I guess I�ll find out tomorrow.
