On the bright side: Theresa’s decadent chocolate chip cookies did thrust me into minor celebrity status this afternoon. From the first bite, the heaping plate I’d brought to the doctor’s office circulated around at light speed to everyone who remained, and several employees came over to me, eyes full of awe and wonderment, to ask what exactly was in these cookies. So I think it’s safe to say they were hit.

Also, nothing bad can happen to you in a place that has this blessing on the wall, right? (Discovered today when I used a bathroom I hadn’t been in before.)

On the down side: it seems my doc was triple-booked today. When I was finally ushered into her office an hour and a half past my appointment time, she was flustered and apologetic. In my experience, even the most delayed appointments rarely evince an apology from a doctor, so I was impressed that she seemed genuinely embarrassed (though my guess is that she wanted to get home, too, as it was late). This wasn’t a huge problem to my mind. Sure, it would’ve been nice if she was on time, but the kids were off with the ex and I was reading schlock magazines, so it was okay. But then we started talking, and it became clear that she had forgotten that I’m, you know, having surgery in a week and a half. With her.

There is a very fine line between “harried, overworked professional who hasn’t had time to refer to her notes” and “OH MY GOD I’m letting this person filet me like a fish and she barely remembers who I am or why I’m here.”

I quietly freaked out for a few minutes while she flipped through my file and then started in on the standard hysterectomy spiel. The window of opportunity for bolting from the office was remarkably short, as it turned out. So we spent our hour in discussion, and except for the part where she felt the need to tell me a rather gruesome parable about what can happen if you don’t follow the doctor’s post-surgical orders, it was all fine. (Trust me, you don’t want to know. It involved intestines in places they didn’t belong due to unbridled libido. I was quick to assure her that “nothing in the vagina” was not so much a post-surgical order as a way of life for me at this time.) (Did anyone hear that thud? That was my father reading my blog, and fainting.)

More good stuff: it sounds like the hospital stay will be shorter than I’d expected. Also, she doesn’t use staples, only stitches, so there is no staple extraction before you go home (I hadn’t decided which sounded worse, having them put in or taken out, but neither really appealed). Lucky me, I even got a nice big bag of hormone patches to take home! Yay! You know how I love free stuff!

I guess I’ll go through with it. But if I go in for my pre-op physical next week and she still doesn’t remember why I’m there, that’s going to be the end of my thin veneer of calm.