Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Cheerful Outfit

Yesterday I had this awesome encounter with a patient of ours. He needed help with some insurance claims which means I'm the person who would help him. I walked in the treatment room and he STOOD to great me. His wife said "Oh! You're the person I spoke with on the phone. So nice to meet you." This patient had a partial nephrectomy for kidney cancer. Turns out his son took out a cancer policy for this "just in case". Thats such a cheerful outfit! You've been so helpful. We appreciate all that you do! I was glowing by the time I was finished. I went off to lunch on a cloud! And it got me thinking - Am I that kind of patient. Am I complimentary enough to people who do their job correctly? Do I remember them and tell them so. Do they leave feeling euphoria after interacting with me? Or do I wallow in chronic illness and need to take a lesson from the cancer people who seem to always have the best outlook? I had a guy tell me "This should be fun.'" in a very sincere voice after I collected $2000 from him for Prostate Cancer surgery. I know this morning I had a nice chat about tequila with my acupuncture doctor. And his staff is always sweet and compliments my wardrobe. But I see them every week. When I was first diagnosed with Neurosarcoid I read the book "Model Patient" by Karen Duffy. It was a great point of view for me to read but certainly not everyone will get her humor. She talks about trying to look nice and be nice and really OWN your illness. Good advice.

So I always try to LOOK good when I don't feel good. Sometimes this is easier said than done. Especially, since I often can't wear make-up (which makes me feel pretty) due to my dry eye issue. (Which hopefully will be fixed tomorrow as we are trying new eye plugs.) But I try to look as put together as I can. How about you?

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