Docs and I Don't Agree

There's a tender spot just above my right ear. This is the ear that has a weird little bump inside the ear canal, making it difficult to wedge an ear bud in tightly. Last night I discover a hard sore spot just behind the ear lobe. I think it's a swollen gland. I can't actually see it, but this is the side of my head where I came away with bloody fingers and no reasonable explanation just a few weeks ago. I make a quick appointment with my primary care physician. But she's fully booked so I get the covering doc instead. I have enough time to get a quick work out in if I hurry.

Can you see me?

I get to the gym a tad late because I'm searching for more moleskin. I've just enough to cover my knuckles for today, but no more! I also have to secure permission for my gabapentin refill. Everything takes so much time, mostly because I'm on hold forever even though I am apparently the only caller in the queue. At the gym, I run into an acquaintance I haven't seen in months. She tells me her father passed over the Easter holidays. He'd been sick with cancer for a very long time so it wasn't totally unexpected, but she's a widow with three boys. At least now her mom is moving in with her, so that's a good thing. And her eldest is going off to college in September. Another good thing.

All this empathy eats into my workout time but I can't say anything. That would be amazingly rude, even for someone like me. I warn her about the two broken kickboxing machines. It's also the one thing she loves to do: whack the heck out of the Nexersys. She starts off on the Left, but it blanks the screen enough, and then resets itself to Tutorial Mode. Then she switches to the Right machine. I'm good with giving both machines a shot. Or two. After warming up, I do 5 rounds on the Right machine, and then 5 rounds on the Left machine. The screens blank occasionally, but nothing resets, maybe because I make a point of flipping the power off for a few seconds and rebooting the system. It's a computer, after all. I just have enough time to unwrap my hands and knock out a quick set of pull ups. I'm 5 minutes late to my doc appointment, but they don't seem to notice.

The doc tells me that it's too soon to take blood for Lyme disease (a positive test means you have Lyme, but a negative test doesn't mean you don't have Lyme), that I don't have any of the symptoms for any of the other really serious tick-borne illnesses. She says I'd be hit with the worst-flu-ever-feeling if I'd contracted ehrlichiosis or something else like Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, or babesiosis. I ask her to look in my hairline over my ear to see if there's a bite or a mark. She sees nothing, and then tells me that ticks don't like human scalps because there's too much hair. That they prefer bare skin creases. Uh, deer and mice are covered in fur.  And ticks. I don't think fur is that much different from hair. She tells me that the hard sore bump behind my ear lobe is probably nothing. Uh, why does it hurt then? I leave with unanswered questions, but my gabapentin is refilled.

I take my son to his dermatologist appointment to see what's happening with some hard scaly patches on his back. The doc says it's not psoriasis so I'm relieved, because that runs in my family. He thinks it's just a reaction to the cream he prescribed. But instead of adjusting the dosage, he proceeds to prescribe another cream, a super-strong, cortico-steroid, anti-inflammatory that he warns might be rejected by my health insurance company. Uh, maybe I don't want to use that on my son? I have super strong versions of hydrocortisone creams at home.

Later, I go to the pharmacy and I can only pick up my refill, but not the cream for my son, I'm secretly relieved. I'm starting to think the dermatologist is a bit script-happy. He'd like me to take my son to a pediatric dermatologist down in Tarrytown just to check out his cheeks. Yes, he has large pores but so does my brother, and so did my mom. He's convinced that this is a hallmark of ice-pick acne scarring, but my son has never had acne on his cheeks, unless you count the baby acne he was born with. That eventually subsided by the time he was 6 months old. My son signals to me that he's not interested, so I tell the doc we'll pass on that. We're going to pass on the cream as well. I'm not very happy with docs lately...

Thursday

10 min elliptical
Miles 0.84
Calories 93.3

T,Y & I raises
3lbs x 15
5lbs x 15

Nexersys
5rounds Beginner Left
5rounds Beginner Right

HGPU 26