Wednesday, October 26, 2011

I gave up a run for that?

I am mad
I wasted my whole morning at the Dr's office AND I MISSED MY RUN.

I had an appointment at 10 am with a vein specialist.  I made an appointment several weeks ago and they called to reschedule for today. No biggy I understand things happen.  I got there 20 min early thinking I would need time to fill out a ridiculous amount of paper work like we always do at the doctor's office.  When I arrived there nobody was at the front desk, I was not sure what to do so I walked in and I saw someone who told me to go sit in the recovery room.  I sat there....and I waited and waited and waited.
At 11 am I got up to go see if someone was working in that office!
I see a gal and she says "it will only be a few more minutes!"
We don't have the same definition of "A FEW"
11:15 comes and I start thinking about leaving because I had to be at the school at 12:30 at the latest.
Then a patient comes in the room, her legs are wrapped in compressions.  She looks at me and asks if I am a patient so I say yes.  She says " You are? your legs look great! did he fixed them for you?" I say no not yet. She asked me several questions about why I was there and kept saying that my legs looked good, I got a little annoyed I must say.

Finally a nurse, not even sure she was a nurse..someone dressed like a nurse, comes and call my name.  I get in a room and meEt the Doctor.  He does not apologize for being over 90 minutes behind schedule and he proceeds to ask me all the questions that we usually answer on the traditional forms and he enters the answers on the computer himself!  I could not believe it! Why not do all that crap with a nurse BEFORE seeing the Dr!  He had a hard time getting the info in  and it was taking forever.  All I could think about was that I would be late to pick up Jonathan.  The nurse came in and asked for my card insurance and I say that I would pay now because I would have to leave quickly after we are done with the Dr's visit.
This was the craziest office I have ever been to.  Completely unorganized.  I was there for my varicose vein and all he wanted to talk about was my thyroid and the fact that I looked stressed!  He took my blood pressure and resting HR and he asked if I was a runner.  Only bonus points he scored with me!!! BP 100/60 and resting HR 58.

I WAS WONDERING IF HE WOULD EVER LOOK AT MY LEGS! Finally he did. 
He said he would need to do an ultrasound for the insurance company to see if they would approve paying for the treatment. OK so I was standing and he puts the cold gel and starts the ultrasound.  After a few minutes he says: "This will not work because you have goosebumps!" WHAT???? He says you should have stayed warm in the waiting room (I was wearing shorts thinking it would help since I was there for my LEGS) and you should have drank a lot of water.  Well it would have been nice if someone would have told me about both those things when I made my appointment!  He said I should make another appointment and we will try this again another day! ALL that waste of time for NOTHING!!!!!!!!!!!
I was furious!

He told me it would cost me $300 to fix one vein and that the recovery would be 2 weeks.
2 weeks of wearing compression socks 24/7.
2 weeks of no running.
He said "we can do this before the spring so you are ready for your racing season!" ??? Hello racing season? in the Spring? in Southern California??? hmmm?
I don't even know that we have a real racing season here since it is pretty much all year long but if I had to choose one I would pick the winter months!

So I got no answer, no plan, no nothing.  Still at square one but with frustrations.
Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
Not sure I will go back. 
Other doctor who could help me is in Los Angeles...that sucks a little.
To be continued.
----------------------------------------
Running this week:
Monday: 3 miles recovery, my legs were pretty sore from my 10k.
Tuesday: 4 miles in light rain! I loved it! 
Wednesday: boooo hoooo
Thursday: Speedwork 400s or tempo: 5 miles..I don't know if the weather is cool and nice I will have a hard time going to the gym.
Friday Rest
Sat: 3 miles
Sunday: 8 miles

This week is Red Ribbon Week at school: Say no to Drugs.
Every day they have something going on, Sunglasses day, crazy socks, PJs day and today crazy hair day!! Hilarious!!!



Will's 2nd grade class. Will: 4th from left

Jonathan's K-1 class.
See how tall Jonathan is (2nd from right)? Boy next to him is in 1st grade.

18 comments:

Emz said...

I'm sorry lady. That sucks.

I'm so loving the photos though. Handsome. Handsome. Little. Men.

Jennifer Spadafora said...

Bummer about the Dr's appt! I hate disorganized offices. Hope you can make up for it tomorrow.

The boys are gorgeous! They take after mama!

SupermomE13 said...

UGH I hate when others are so uncaring about other people's time. And I am sorry you didn't get an answers or a plan. I have horrible veins in one leg... they look awful but don't hurt me at all so I have been hesitant to go to a doc because I am afraid if they mess with them that they WILL start hurting and I figure ugly and pain free is better than pretty and hurting, especially for running.

Anyway, sorry again you had such a rotten morning! LOVE the pics though. Your boys are crazy cute :)

Unknown said...

I came unglued at the dentist for them being 1/2 hour late. I started asking them at 15 minutes late what time my daughter would be seen. "In a minute." Whatever, if you're running late, tell me so I can make a decision to reschedule.

Communication, that's all I need.
Sorry about your doctor visit. You have much more patience than I do.

RockStarTri said...

I hate when doctors disrespect patients like that. It is one thing if it is an emergency but this just reeks of incompetence. Would make me doubt his ability in other more important stuff.

Elle said...

Love these pics!

OMG, that doc's office is so poorly organized. I would be afraid to go back there.

Perhaps there IS someone else in your area to see? Good luck with it.

Pam @ herbieontherun.com said...

I was just fussing today about how no one thinks my time is as valuable as theirs is. Doctors are the WORST about this!!!

Vanessa @ Gourmet Runner said...

Those handsome boys! What a terrible experience today at the doctor. I wonder if they were just really understaffed? It sounds like chaos!

Kate Geisen said...

OF COURSE you looked stressed...you'd been waiting for almost 2 hours! Have you checked him out? Maybe today was just an off day, but if that's how things normally are I don't think I'd want that office providing my care.

Amanda@runninghood said...

I would have been so frustrated!! grrrrr is right! And yes, I miss Chris a ton. He was my only male reader...ha! Well, I have a couple.

Jim ... 50after40 said...

Ah, that sucks! Probably really disappointing with a large buildup like that. Awesome FauxHawks on the little dudes too!

Jason said...

You are such a nice lady to only use the word grrrr......I would have had much more to say than that.

BTW - the kids hair is great. Jonathon looks like the character that Martin Short used to play (can't remember the name of the character)

Duke b-ball is getting revved up again. You ready?

Big Daddy Diesel said...

This is why I hate doctors!!!! Ughhhh!!!!

I read a long time ago, that someone sued a doctor for being 45 minutes late and he won, I thought that was cool and remembered it after reading your post

PS you been tagged for a blogging award

Terzah said...

Yuck! It sounds like it might be worth driving a ways to see a different doctor. What a pain! I'm sorry you had to waste all that time.

Great pictures of your boys!

Black Knight said...

Change doctor. If this is the start I don't know what can happen in the future. The organization must be the first step. I am sorry for your "adventure".
Here I don't use the Public Health because the risk is similar, I have an insurance (part of my work contract) that covers also the private visits, texts, surgeries ecc.
Your children are gorgeous.

Laima said...

Some dr's offices charge patients for being late or missing appts - wish we could do the same to them:)

Great hair!

Unknown said...

Ugh... I'm frustrated just reading this... I can't imagine sitting through it! ((HUGS)) to you!!!

Your boys are awesome!

Christy @ My Dirt Road Anthem: A Runner's Blog said...

Ugh how frustrating! and then you have to pay so much for wasting your time. I would have been mad too!