Do I Stutter?

Since I communicate for a living, I usually don't have a hard time making myself understood.

I'm pretty ... plain-spoken. Forthright. Forthcoming.

Which is why I'm so frustrated with my doctor right now -- a great doc and diagnostician, who -- I should say, has taken great care of me for decades.

But now we're at an impasse.

I'm not sick (as far as I know) -- I just have this recurring left side pain. It comes. It goes. Sometimes it's so bad I can't walk. Sometimes it goes away after an Advil.And some days, it doesn't show up at all.

It's not an ache. It's not a strain. It's not normal.

My doc ruled out the usual suspect Girlie parts, and then decided to send me on to the GI guy. Whom I know. He isn't very likeable but he is a VERY good doctor.

I really don't think this pain is GI-related (since I don't have a single GI symptom) -- but I'm trying to be open-minded, making room for the possibility that I did not, in fact, go to Med School.

Unlike many patients, I don't object to the prospect of the recommended colonoscopy. If it's gotta be done, it's gotta be done. I know the TEST isn't nearly as bad as the rap it gets, and I know this guy is good, and that he's a big fan of drugs.

All I keep telling them is: I can't drink the two-liter prep.

And all they keep hearing is: I WON't.

I'm not being difficult. I'm not a two-year old.

When I say I can't, that's what I mean. I can't keep the stuff down.

I had these tests back in college, and I couldn't keep it down then either. They attempted the tests, more than once, and then eventually sent me home to fast. For a long time. Eventually I came back.Eventually they did the tests.And I never was able to drink the prep.I was RIGHT. They were WRONG.

It was a simple procedure made unnecessarily complicated and expensive -- time and money wasted -- just because the Doc at the time refused to believe I'd never lost an argument over what will make me throw up.

My current doc knows all this.

But what I keep being told is, "We can't help you if you won't take the test."

Lots of people WON'T take this test. They refuse to. I get that. But I'm not in that camp.I would. I would (if it was necessary) I just need some slightly customized instructions on getting ready for it.

So, what I got instead of help or a diagnosis, was a referral to my ob-gyn. In two weeks.

(I've dated enough doctors to know the words NON COMPLIANT have probably now been stamped on my chart, which loosely translates as "Let her die.")

And the OB probably won't be able to figure it out either.

And meanwhile, I don't think I can watch any more House.

Or NBC News.

Tonight included a segment on a poor girl who had this mystery-left-side pain for YEARS -- and was mis-diagnosed with everything from bladder infections to lazy ovaries. (Am pretty sure mine are antagonistic.)

What she HAD was Deep Vein Thrombosis.

She didn't die. But the clot got so big and old and hard now they CAN't remove it. (Or I don't know: maybe they WON't).

All I know is, if THAT's what I have, everybody is gonna be really sorry for being so Mean to me.