Wordsley, Stourbridge, England: 24 degrees, hot, sunny and with beautiful blue skies.
It’s Friday, and I’m tired, but it’s a big day for me because I have a doctor’s appointment at 7:00 p.m.
Well, I believe it’s a doctor’s appointment; it’s at the GP health clinic where I recently registered myself. It could be a nurse or a doctor; I won’t find out until I’m there. A usual Friday morning, when I have fewer classes than on other days of the week, it is the eve of the weekend, so it is lighter. Besides, I won’t give classes late this Friday night, as I have a doctor’s appointment.
I did an excellent workout in the morning, outside on the patio, using elastic and skipping for at least 20 minutes. I watered the garden and refilled the bird feeders. What a wonderful start to the day. My mother doesn’t get up until much later, so I can enjoy some quality time with myself, which is so essential for me.
If we are always arranging to spend quality time with others — family and friends — why can’t we also spend some quality time with ourselves?
It feels so good. I taught until 5:00 p.m. and then prepared to visit the doctor’s. I was not worried, but I was anxious to know the results of my blood, urine, stool, and cancer screening tests.
I walked from Wordsley to Kingswinford, about 3 kilometres, and arrived at the health clinic 15 minutes before 7:00 p.m. When you arrive at the health clinic, you are greeted by a screen. You must enter the month you were born, then the year, and eventually, through deduction, it asks you if you are the person you claim to be. After confirming your identity, you are then instructed to go to the waiting room.
There is no physical contact with a receptionist, secretary, or anyone else; it feels quite cold, clinical, and solitary.
I waited for over 15 minutes, then on a large overhead monitor, I was instructed to go to room 7, where Mrs Jackie O’Leary would be waiting. I walked down the long corridor and found room 7. I knocked and entered, and a large woman in a blue nurses’ uniform greeted me with a broad smile and a cheerful, evidently confident personality.
She asked me to remove my shoes and stand on the weighing scales. I was 101 kilos, which is too heavy for me and probably 95% of the world’s population. Even if we take off 1K of clothes, I am still too heavy, not a good start.
I had left Brazil weighing 94 kilos, so I have gained at least 6 kilos since being in England. During the winter months, I was a bit lazy or slow to exercise because I couldn’t do it outside. I am used to exercising more outdoors than indoors, owing to my routines in both Copacabana and Botafogo in Rio.
Jackie confirmed my height as 1 metre 78 and started explaining all the information on her screen. I asked some questions, and she had others to complete my medical details and report further. She took my blood pressure three times to get the most accurate average.
I asked her about her name, O’Leary, and whether she was Irish. She said she was from here—a woman from the Black Country—but had been married to an Irishman for nearly 30 years, which was how she acquired the surname O’Leary. I was curious and asked because I had many Irish friends from living in London and Rio.
There was an Irish pub in Ipanema where two of the partners and the chef were Irish, and we used to stay up until sometimes 4:00 or 5:00 in the morning drinking with friends. This pub would welcome many expat engineers who had contracts to work in Brazil when Petrobras was profitable and the centre of oil and gas in the 90s and early 2000s.
Back to nurse Jackie: she started telling me that, based on the information gathered in front of her — my liver, kidneys, etc. — my organs are all okay. I do not have diabetes; I am near the limit but not quite there yet. My blood pressure is slightly high but not too much; I am bordering on hypotension, so I need to be careful.
The real issue is my cholesterol level, which isn’t too high but still elevated. Since I regularly exercise and walk a lot, it could have been much worse if I were a couch potato. But because I am not, I’m protecting myself.
Thank goodness I’m not a potato couch!
She brought out a red plastic tube with yellow foam inside to show me a model of an artery and cholesterol. It looked a little like some not very clear sexual toy or accessory, but she was very clear and objective with her explanation.
All the explanation was to justify prescribing me Statin. I would soon discover through Google Doctor that it has serious side effects, and to get off it’s pretty tricky if you have been on it for a long time.
At that exact moment, I asked her about the side effects, and she said that if I were her partner, she would advise me to take it. When she said this, I felt she was not entirely sincere about her motives. I sensed that it was more about meeting sales quotas and targets within the GP clinic, which may need to be achieved.
It is terrible to think, say or write that, but it was what I felt.
We cannot be so naive as to believe that this kind of practice never occurs or that it is rare. I agreed to try ‘Statin’, which I would need to collect from my chosen local chemist in a couple of days, but I also knew I would research it thoroughly before taking it, and, to some extent, my intuition was already telling me not to.
We are talking about the NHS, the National Health Service, just like SUS in Brazil. It is a government health agency, so we understand that, in general, governments nowadays do not genuinely care about their people. Any health service or welfare state is the government’s Achilles’ Heel, with excessively high running costs to sustain it. We need to be cautious and suspicious of what is being offered or decided on our behalf.
My cancer screening results were not on the computer, and since it was a national campaign not involving the clinic directly, Jackie told me that the results would come directly to me by post at my mother’s address.
In conclusion, I am relatively healthy, but I need to lose weight and control my diet and portion sizes. I have a small cholesterol problem, which I will have to research a little before deciding whether I’m going to take Statin or not.
At the end, I thanked nurse Jackie for her time and patience and then left the clinic. Julie messaged me, and she was already out in the street with Austin. They were in the park, and we could meet anywhere in the park or in the churchyard next to it, which I would need to pass through to get there.
It is a charming little church, with a part of the graveyard neatly cut, trimmed, and well looked after, while another part is almost abandoned and wilder, which makes an interesting contrast in some ways.
As I wandered through the church grounds, a tall, slender, and beautiful fox suddenly crossed my path about three metres in front of me. It did not seem bothered by my presence. It continued on its way, stopped, and then looked back at me, holding its position and stare for at least ten seconds.
We both paused, gazing at each other — a shared moment between me and a wild, lovely creature, each looking into the other’s eyes. The fox did not appear to be afraid of me, and I felt the same about him.
Even though I had received relatively good news from the doctors, seeing this beautiful animal and feeling so natural was quite special for me. I found Austin and Julie; Austin was pleased to see me, Julie less so. We walked, and it always surprises me how hidden this park is from the main road where Julie lives.
It is a hidden gem in the village!
We left Austin at Julie’s parents’ house and went for a drink at a local pub. It was pleasant but nothing special, like the places we’re used to visiting. We talked briefly about my exam results; I left Julie at home and walked back to my mother’s in Wordsley. When I arrived, my mother was up watching TV, and I told her about what had happened at the doctor’s.
In bed by 1:00 p.m.
Thank you.
Thanks for reading this blog post. Please explore my other posts and share your thoughts in the comments section.
Richard
