Ordeal
Posted By Russ Emerson on December 5, 2003 at 10:00 pm
Being male is almost always a great thing. Being over 40, however, takes a bit of the shine off maleness.
The shine really dulls on that one day a year. Guys-over-40, you know what I mean. The much-feared annual doctor visit. The checkup. The physical.
Sure, sure, the blood work-ups are easy. You go in a couple days prior, they stick you, and then send a couple vials of blood off for various tests. Trouble is, I always end up having to have something else checked because of the lab results. Last year it was the gall bladder. This year it’s my liver.
I think my internal organs are conspiring against me.
The doctor clucks, making “tsk tsk” sounds, tells you it’s probably nothing, jots in your file, asks the usual questions. But it’s all an act, designed to lull you into a false sense of security. “Maybe,” you think to yourself, “he will forget about it this year.”
Oh, no, no, no — you aren’t that lucky. He remembers.
First, it’s “Turn your head and…” whatever. Guys, you know what I mean.
Then the dreaded command. “Lean on the exam table.” Inevitably you find yourself having to channel Eric Cartman.
Forget trying to make a joke – he’s heard all of them before. All of them. Don’t even try. It might not have occured to you, but the doctor dreads the whole experience as much as (or perhaps even more than) you do.
Just grit your teeth. Take one for the home team. Lean on the table and think of America.
No wonder we men die younger than women do.
Quit whining..I had my female physical last week AND not only are we subjected to the same finger physical, but we also have to endure cold utensils that venture into more into the hinterland regions.
No whining. That’s what “grit your teeth” is all about.
In other words, “What would John Wayne do?”
Yep, females have it worse, no doubt. AND don’t forget the whole giving birth thing we have to go through, not to mention the nine months prior to the big event. And we have to go through the yearly humiliating exam.
Jennifer Martinez sends
Yes, undeniably true. But there’s a difference.
Women are used to it, from an early age.
See, we men go blithely through our youth, unconcerned about foolish “exams” or “physicals.”
Then, one day we wake up, over 40, and the doctor’s secretary is on the phone scheduling us for our checkup.
That’s all fine and good. Until….
It comes as a complete surprise (or if not that, then we’ve successfully deceived ourselves into thinking it’s all a tissue of lies designed to scare us.)
Let’s just say the shock of the new experience takes a number of years off our lives. I think that more-than-adequately explains why mens’ life expectencies are so much shorter than womens’.
You got a point there, Russ… But it’s better than waking up and finding that your prostate is swollen to the size of a basketball with cancer, right…?
–TwoDragons
No, prostate cancer isn’t best treated by the advice “eh, just walk it off,” but we treat it as if it were.
Frankly, I think most men would sooner die with a semblance of dignity than undergo the anal probe repeatedly.
Let me put it this way: if someone held a gun to my head and told me I had to get a tattoo, I’d have one on my butt that said “One Way – Exit Only.”