My doctor is trying to kill me!

Oh, you're exaggerating, you're thinking. Well, you decide.

My doctor is old school. He definitely fits the "old" part of old school, but I'm not sure he went to school, at least not medical school. (Okay, he probably did, but you'll soon see what I'm saying.)

Not that he's not a nice guy. He's a super nice guy. And he shares this nice little office in the Chicago suburbs with a chain smoking cardiologist, so his office smells like a casino at four in the morning. But the secondhand smoke, while unpleasant, isn't the issue. The danger is much more direct.

I'll just tell you about a recent visit. I had two things I was concerned about: a boil on my chest and a little lump on my forearm. So there I was inhaling the secondhand smoke in the waiting room. I was nervous because I knew what my doctor was like. But the thing is he got things done. He wasn't afraid to do just about anything in his office. Once he cut a mole off my cheek. (I said, "Are you sure you want to do this in here? I mean, it's my face and all, so I want it to look okay." He smiled and said, "I'll make you look interesting.") Really, I think he would do anything short of a heart transplant. Or maybe he'd do that too. He'd just have the cardiologist assist him. But back to this visit.

So yeah, I was nervous. But I figured it was best to get this over with. So there I sat with my thigh bouncing like a diving board after a cannonball, and that's when I heard the first cry. It was the patient currently in with my doctor. I thought, No, I probably just imagined I heard that.

"Aaaaahhhh!" came another cry.

There was no denying that one. And the one that followed. And all that followed that. I was like, I gotta get out of here. But I sat there transfixed, second by second, my body trembling with each blood curdling cry.

Now I was next.

Using the babiest of baby steps I made my way into his office—and he was cleaning blood off the curtains! Yes, blood! He had a rag and he was wiping them down! (And his curtains were plastic, like this happened all the time!) I know, I know, I should've left, but it was too late—I was mesmerized and in his Svengali-like power.

He tossed the bloody rag (I was tempted to ask him about the bio-hazard risk but couldn't speak). Then he told me to take off my shirt and lay on my back on the exam table. What could I do? I obeyed.

Now I think it's important to point out that I like to do health things slowly. Very slowly. Some would say too slowly. Like, my typical approach would be to say to him, "let's consider this visit a consultation, doc, and maybe we'll do something in the coming year."

I barely had time to see him as he appeared over me with a lance and stabbed it into the boil on my chest.

"Aaaaaaahhhh!"

"There, that takes care of that. Now where's that lump on your arm?"

Seriously? I was so tempted to tell him it went away, but then what if he found it on his own? He'd probably amputate my arm. In abject terror, I pointed to the lump.

I could feel the cool of the alcohol prep cloth as he shimmed it over the area. Oh God. I closed my eyes. Let him do what he's going to do, but I just don't want to look at it.

Now, he was saying things like, "I bet it's a lipoma. It's probably a lipoma."

(Like I'm supposed to know what a lipoma is!)

I felt the scalpel slice into my forearm. It hurt but it was manageable.

"There. That's it," he said.

I breathed my first clear breath since I'd walked into the office.

"See?" he said.

See what? I opened my eyes.

A strange, lima bean-shaped thing was only inches from my face!

 "Aaaaaaahhhh! Get that thing out of here!"

He did. Getting sewn up wasn't bad at all, and I was in and out of there in fifteen minutes. Like I said, he gets things done. When I arrived home, I checked my phone, and there was an email from his office.

It was one of those surveys. The first question was:

"Would you recommend doctor to a friend?"

I started thinking about the people I hated.