So a few weeks ago I got some poison ivy. It was bad times. I got it on a Wednesday, and by Friday it was starting to show. Over the weekend we figured out it was poison ivy, and by that time I figured I would call the doctor first thing Monday morning to get it taken care of.

So I call on Monday morning and they look me up and the lady I talked to told me because I’ve never actually been IN to see the doctor, that I couldn’t get in – they apparently only see new patients on certain days and there’s like a month wait. So even though we transferred our whole family’s records over there 2-3 years ago and everyone else in my family has been seen there tons of times, that didn’t matter.

Armed with that excitement, I drove myself up to the urgent care and saw the doctor there. They shot me up with something and gave me a prescription for a steroid. That worked out very well (plus I suddenly started hitting TONS of home runs!) and the swelling went down. But towards the end of the week I started getting a rash and bumps all over more of my body.

I figured the steroid just wore off or something, so I knew I’d have to go back in to the doctor. I knew I still couldn’t get in to see my family doctor, but I figured that I’d just call them to make an appointment for a physical or something so at least that way the next time I actually WAS sick, I could get right in. But when I called them, they looked me up with my name / SSN / birth-date and the lady said that I was in the system and they had a chart on me. So I got in for an appointment the next day.

4:00 or so the next day I drive in to the doctor’s office and sign in. The receptionist calls me over and apparently there is some sort of problem with my chart – i.e. it doesn’t REALLY exist. At this point I was not really sure whether or not I had been to this doctor or not. Like I said it’s been 2-3 years since I’ve had to go into the doctor and so I couldn’t remember one way or the other. Of course, at this point, sitting in the waiting room, I certainly wasn’t going to ADMIT to them that I had never been there (even if I was sure), because I was afraid that they would just be like “Ooh suerie you can’t be seen”. So I was kind of vague, though really I couldn’t just remember, and without being sure one way or the other, like I said, I wasn’t going to admit to anything. So this receptionist starts kind of badgering me about it like “Well what office did you go to” or “Which doctor did you see” and I’m all like “I’m not sure”, etc. Then she comes out with this classic line (and I quote):

“Well, maybe you need to call your mama and ask her when was the last time you went to the doctor?”

I was stunned. I think my jaw literally dropped. I said “Excuse me?!?!?”, she repeated herself, and I asked “How old do you think I am?!” She had my birthdate right in front of her so she was like Oh 30 years old. But that didn’t faze her – she said something about how she was 43 and she just had to ask her mom last week about something with immunizations. I told her I thought her tone was insulting and she gave me a fake apology.

Really a classic line. In the end, she talked to the doctor and the doctor said it was fine to see me, she gave me more Prednisone and now I am officially in the system (through the back-door).