Thursday, June 12, 2014

Cringe-worthy Moments

Cringe-worthy moments - we've all had them. They're those moments that you did or said something you desperately wish you could take back. But they're the moments that eventually fade into amusing anecdotes. Given enough time.


I have two stellar cringes.

Both were in my years of procreation. I found that all the niceties you'd been taught - to keep your knees together, to be modest, to keep your private parts private - go out the window when you're pregnant. You show bits of yourself, that you'd never dream showing in normal circumstances, to complete strangers. Who hasn't, in the throes of labour, offered to let someone check how far they're dilated only to find out that the person you were offering yourself up to was just there to do a quick tidy of the room and check supplies?

My first cringe-worthy moment was in my first pregnancy. I can talk about it now because it was over 27 years ago and time heals all excruciating embarrassment. I'd found a lump in my left breast. My doctor wasn't too concerned but wanted me to have it checked out just to be sure. So I went to my hospital appointment and was told to undress, put on a hospital gown and wait to be examined by an intern.

And I waited. And waited (it was a public hospital and a two hour wait is almost mandatory in a public hospital when you're basically naked). Finally someone came into the room and it happened to be a someone I had gone to high school with. Cringe!

I had to let him examine my huge, bovine breasts and as he was doing so, it dawned on me that he didn't actually recognise me. But instead of thinking 'phew, I've dodged a bullet there' I proceeded to introduce myself. Yep - I had to remind him that we'd been classmates just a few short years before. More cringe!!

And then his supervisor came in with a full complement of other students in tow to discuss my 'friend's' findings. Luckily I was allowed to cover myself up by then. It was decided that the lump was just a fibrous benign lump.

Being that it was a teaching hospital, that was a good moment for the supervisor to actually do a bit of teaching. He asked the group when would be the best time for surgery on a pregnant woman if the lump did need to be removed. There was dead silence. Until I piped up with an answer - the right answer, I might add.

I may have not had any dignity left but at least I could leave on a winning note.


My other incredibly cringe-worthy moment came in my third pregnancy. I was at ten weeks and I'd started to have some bleeding and cramping. It wasn't a lot of blood and the cramping hadn't gone on for too long but I knew that I needed to get checked out. So Iven took me up to the hospital.

They took me straight in and I didn't have to wait terribly long to be seen thank goodness. But once again the doctor that they sent in was one I'd gone to high school with.

Seriously??! How does that happen twice?

And this time was even better than the last. I refreshed his memory about our prior class-mate status in the middle of an internal exam. Again - seriously?? Who does that??? What a fun moment that was - reminiscing over the good old high school days when he was... well, let's not talk about where he was and what he was doing. But having said that, it was interesting to hear what some of my old classmates were up to.

So there you go - two of my finest! Over to you now.

14 comments:

  1. Oh gosh. So many former classmates became docs! I've got nothing.

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  2. I'm like Marcia - nothing!! However that is probably because it is bedtime - I feel sure that about 2 or 3 am I will think of all kinds of things!!!

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  3. Wow. I've had a former classmate take my bloods, my Aspie (read freaking out at blood test time) kids' bloods, and test me for whooping cough which turned out to be positive. She asked me to put on a mask, and I laughed, and she said, I'm serious, put a mask on. the other cringe-making time was when I finally managed to push out number one son who was stuck in birth canal due to being too long but too far in for c-section, and having been almost torn in half, and everyone in the hospital came in to have a look, having not seen a woman being cut and also having torn so much ever before. And doctor stitching me up was incredibly hot surfing dude. Cringe right there.

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  4. No nothing that I can remember... but one day while we were sitting in the club house chatting after training one of the girls was still stretching outside and I was the only one looking in that direction! I don't know when it happened, but her pants had torn!!! When she came in I said to her, don't turn around...

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  5. Pregnancy really does put you through the wringer when it comes to embarrassing positions, but two docs from your high school? - cringe-worthy indeed! My son has quitea few friends in medical school - I can imagine the horror of being an old lady one day and getting a colonoscopy or some other embarassing exam from one of them - ha ha!

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  6. "huge bovine breasts" is my favorite line. Oh, so uncomfortable. And like you said, happens to us all at some point. I saw the guy who did my colonoscopy at the pool a few days later and that made me feel rather embarrassed, I will admit!

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  7. That is too funny, Char! And of course it would have to be guys you'd gone to school with! They never see us when we're dressed up, looking fabulous, do they?!

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  8. Nothing yet, but a couple of my former classmates have become doctors so really any day now I'll probably have an extremely embarrassing medical situation...

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  9. I work in a hospital...during my first pregnancy I was high risk due to several miscarriages...so I had to get a vaginal ultrasound several times. You guessed it, one of my friends (male) had to do the exam....TERRIBLE. lol

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  10. Well, Thursday the resident assisting my doctor on my hip came in to initial the injury site, and I trained him and see him at work like, every day. And the surgery site was my hip, so - awkward.

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  11. Ouch! Fortunately mine have usually involved me saying stupid stuff - no nudity required! ;-)

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  12. Awkward!

    Wish I'd gone to school with so many future Doctors. Could well see myself a lady of leisure, Nanny doing the parenting, on account of my talented and educated husband bringing in the big bucks.

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  13. Did you have a big high school class? At least now they were both several years ago. Not saying you're old. Just your kids are.

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    1. There were probably over 100 in the year and because we'd swap class groups for most subjects there was a lot of them that you'd come in contact with. And quite a lot ended up doing medicine.

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