In Which Two Wrongs Make a Right

I went to the doctor today, becuase I've had a cold this week and it seemed like it was turning into a sinus infection. I figured I should head it off at the pass early, rather than the two previous times when I've ended up in the urgent care center with a blinding headache and fever. (Note that urgent care here doesn't mean the emergency room, just one of those places where they see you the same day.)

So, as usual when I'm at the doctor's office, they checked my blood pressure and it was a little high. (In case you're interested, there's an interesting article in a recent issue of Annals of Behavioral Medicine -- yeah, just a little light reading -- that suggests that patients who think they have high blood pressure actually show a larger "white coat effect" (higher blood pressure readings at the doctor's office than in other settings) than individuals who are not worried about their blood pressure. So, anxiety appears to account for some of the effect.)

Anyhow, the doctor was examining me, and he said he wanted to check just one thing, and started rummaging around in the drawers of medical supplies. (Perfectly innocuous medical supplies, by the way, tongue depressors and that sort of thing.) Well, apparently something in my subconcious said, "oh no, a shot!", and I started to get the dizzy, woozy reaction that I have when I'm faced with a needle. (Normally I take a bottle of Coke with me to the docs for just such a circumstance -- the caffiene and sugar apparently counteract the shock response -- but since this was an 8 AM appointment and I was pretty sure there would be no injections, I didn't do that. And didn't eat breakfast, either. Oops!)

So, I didn't want to admit that I was such a big medical weenie, so I didn't say anything to the doctor, but just tried to squeeze my hands and breathe deeply so I wouldn't faint, and it worked. And in the meantime, he decided to take my blood pressure again to see if it had gone down. Well, one of the physical effects of the shot anxiety is a big drop in blood pressure. So, he took the reading right in the middle of that, and of course my blood pressure was much lower -- "just fine!" Hah! I am clearly a terrible patient because I didn't bother to correct him about the real reason. :)