Playing Doctor

heart2If you had a brain tumour that needed removing. Or a heart valve that was blocked.  Would you go to the doctor? Or, like me,  would you tackle it yourself?

Seriously.   I’m not an idiot.  I don’t need some know-all surgeon, poking his trained nose where it’s not wanted. Charity? No thanks. No-one knows my body better than me. If it’s broke, I’ll fix it. I’ve seen the films. Heart: somewhere between kidney and intestine, right? How hard can it be?

So. Close the door – to the doctor and the helpers and the experts and the other patients. Take a knife and hack at your own body.  Stagger round the garden with a scalpel, aiming for the right bit.

Laughable, of course.  An act of madness.

Yes.  And yet.

When it comes to soul care, I reckon I’m the expert.  Scrub myself up with  good intentions.  Bind my own wounds with excuses and lies. Close the door to the real doctor, then stick in the knife and wonder why I’m bleeding.

There’s some things you can’t fix yourself. Don’t die trying.

 

4 thoughts on “Playing Doctor

  1. Wow, something I knew but didn’t want to be true. Something I am more scared of than anything.

  2. I laughed a little at this – here’s why:
    My dietician wants me to submit to blind weighing and leave her in control of my weight and diet. Because I live in East Asia and don’t have access to regular medical care, my friend is having to weigh me and email the result to my dietician each week. I am not coping very well with this situation. Before we tried it the first time I expressed my fears about it to my friend, whose response was, “you wouldn’t insist on staying awake and taking out your own appendix. You’ve asked the dietician to help you, so let her do it.” Which made me wonder if my friend lnows or understands me at all… Of course I’d want to take out my own appendix. Or at least be conscious (though some local anaesthetic or an epidural would be quite nice) during the process. Does she honestly think I could give someone else that kind of control over my body!?

    I guess I have some “letting go” issues to work on…

  3. PWP: we’ve all got ‘letting go’ issues I reckon. But good to have friends who help prise open our fingers sometimes too :-)

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