Part 2

Next morning when I went to dispose of my two remaining envelopes I discovered that the first one called for what is known as the blood urea test--where they jab a needle-pointed syringe into a vein in the arm and draw off quantities of blood. Then, as if they suspect you of holding back on them, they send you into another room where they puncture the lobe of the ear, drain off more blood--if you have any left--and store it away in glass tubes labeled with your name and number.

The young lady at the desk gave me a numbered card--number 6, I recall, for I was early. “Take a chair,” she said as she wrote number 7 on a slip for the man behind me. I sat there an hour or so, studying the faces of the crowd and listening to the monotonous “Take a chair,” when a nurse opened a nearby door and called out numbers one to six. The first six of us filed into a small anteroom where we were requested to remove our coats and roll up the left sleeve. Through the door leading into an adjoining room we could see a number of nurses in uniform, and on a table near the door were several strange looking instruments, glass containers, etc. Extending past the left side of the entrance we could see about eighteen inches of what seemed to be an operating table, and altogether the interior did not look inviting.

Number one, a tall hardy Scotchman, was soon called and as he stretched himself on the table we could see his feet projecting over the end at the doorway. For a moment all eyes and ears were strained, then suddenly a heavy groan issued from within, accompanied by a violent swinging and jerking of the patient’s feet. Presently the legs dropped, and after a few convulsive twitches the feet hung limp over the table end. From what we could see, it looked as if the nurses had won the first fall, and had the victim’s shoulders pinned to the mat. Among the five waiting occupants in the anteroom was a rather pale looking chap who stood for a moment with wide-staring eyes, then suddenly gathering up his hat and coat he exclaimed, “Here’s where I quit!” At which he jerked open the door and disappeared.

At the desk where I had postponed my appointment the day before I spent two hours waiting and another half hour going through some sort of heart test; then for a circulation test they kept me another hour with one foot and leg thrust into a covered vessel of water, which threw me into a state of nervous apprehension by continually bubbling as if it were boiling. This operation was supervised by a vivacious little nurse who kept track of my pulse; and observing my anxiety, she did her best to engage my attention by relating a tragic chapter of the story of her life. She timed the story so that it ended coincidentally with the circulation test; then she lifted the cover, tested the water with a thermometer, and assured me it was cool; also that the flesh on my leg was still intact. I thanked her and said it was the most enjoyable examination I had had.

Following this I hurried through a fifteen minute luncheon, and spent three hours waiting for my doctor.

“I observe you are no less a humorist than a physician,” I said, remembering the loss of my breakfast and luncheon the day before. “You gave me a two days’ job to perform before breakfast.” Aside from provoking a flicker of a smile this did not change the gravity of his countenance in the least. He asked me a number of new questions, about everything except the part that troubled me. Whenever I asked about my kidney he always answered by asking me about something else--on the theory, perhaps, that having the kidney safely quarantined, he was interested solely in exploring for new trouble.

When he inquired about my stomach I was prepared for him, for I had been forewarned as to the rigors of this examination, which consists of swallowing the nozzle end of a rubber hose and forcing a quantity of dry bread crumbs down alongside it, then with the hose dangling from your mouth you take your place in the line and wait for the food to digest. By means of a pumping device on the outer end of the hose they test the contents of your stomach every half hour or so to see how you are getting along. I emphasized the fact that my digestive organs were in perfect working order and would rival the gizzard of an ostrich. Thus after an eloquent protest I escaped the dreadful stomach test.

THE CYSTOSCOPIC TRAP

The doctor tapped his desk thoughtfully for a moment, then suddenly his face lit up with some brilliant thought and he wrote out orders for five more examinations. Though I had won my point I didn’t like the contented smile with which he handed them to me. I went out felicitating myself on having cleverly side-stepped the stomach test, but a few hours later I discovered the cause of his merriment, for I walked right into another, much worse--a cystoscopic examination--where they insert something that feels like a piece of rusty barbed wire into the bladder and up through the ureter into the kidney. Affixed to the inner end of this ingenious apparatus--which has an opening through the center--there is a tiny electric light bulb, by means of which they get a view of the interior furnishings. To facilitate this they dilate the parts by pumping in air, soda, transparent acids and suchlike pain-producing inventions.

The process of exploring by alternately probing, twisting, pumping and expanding the inside membraneous walls of the kidney is unpityingly pursued as long as the victim remains conscious; and up to this point is as far as I am able to give an account of the performance. In fact there is no use attempting further to describe it, because no printable language can do it justice.

They don’t like to give an anesthetic in this case, for the reason that you can suffer more and they claim they can get better results without it. It’s like the old-fashioned idea that in confinement cases anything given to mitigate the pain is apt to injure the child. The only near-humorous feature that I discovered in the whole procedure was the remark of one of the examining physicians, that he didn’t think it would hurt--much.

There was a pet expression that he used repeatedly: whenever he gave the vitals a vigorous probe that involuntarily tightened every muscle and nearly lifted me off the operating table he would say, “Now _relax_, please.”

I asked why they called it an examination instead of an operation. He said it sounded less painful; and if the patients knew it were an operation they would either refuse to take it, or else insist on being etherized. When it was over, the only report I could get was, that it was “satisfactory” (to them at least), and that the kidney was “still functioning.” They gave me another bottle of castor oil and put me to bed for twenty-four hours to recuperate and muster strength for the next examination. The doctor assured me that castor oil was very “cleansing,” and he warned me that any substitute might prove injurious. I didn’t think to inquire if he had an interest in the drugstore where they sold it.

After recovering from this and the four examinations that followed I felt that every part of me had been subjected to a scrutiny as thorough as it was painful, and I became positively convinced that whatever else ailed me, I was threatened with sheer nerve exhaustion. I never dreamed there were so many painfully expert methods of examining the interior of a human being.

YOU NEVER DISCOVER IF YOU HAVE PASSED OR FLUNKED YOUR EXAMINATIONS

The next time I saw the doctor he handed me another batch of envelopes, which I apologetically declined. Having just come from a very disagreeable and seemingly unnecessary ordeal, for which I had waited several hours, I was in a state of hostile rebellion. It was like being repeatedly put on trial for crimes of which you are innocent; and I decided that as long as I could get no information whatever about my kidney, or indeed anything else, it were better to let the remainder of my organs rest as long as they were at ease.

“Doctor,” said I, “I’ve already explained to you what my trouble is, and if you are putting me through these third degree maneuvers merely for the sake of killing time while the X-ray pictures are being developed, I prefer to choose some less heroic diversion. I’m not concealing any ailment from you and I don’t care to waste any more of my time or yours hunting for something that seems to bother you more than it does me.”

The doctor protested vigorously; he seemed to regard my attitude as nothing less than mutiny. He declared that all these tests, and a great many more, were absolutely necessary to complete the records of my case; and that if I refused to continue there was grave danger of annulling all the good that had been accomplished. I said that if any important discovery had been made I’d like to be let in on the secret. That, he said, would be contrary to the rules. I insisted that being the owner of the kidney, I was entitled to know something about the reasons, or at least the results, of all this grilling process; and as for the sealed verdicts of their examinations, they meant nothing whatever to me; that what I came there for was to have my kidney X-rayed, not to be fluoroscoped and dissected from head to foot. Seeing that the reports on all the tests and examinations were written in medical terms, and that they were alike inaccessible and incomprehensible to me, I was not disposed to contribute the additional time and money necessary to make a complete set of historical records in which I had no interest or understanding.

“But our records are a valuable contribution to medical science,” he argued.

“In that case,” said I, “those who are interested in such matters can provide their own subjects for clinical experimentation. As for me, my tastes run in other channels.”

At this point I am reminded that one day while waiting near one of the appointment desks I overheard a spirited conversation between two patients who were trying to figure out why it was that for ten days they had both been taking the same identical examinations, one for a swelling in the ear, the other for a dislocated knee-cap. Finally one of them reached the conclusion that “in a laundry all shirts, whether dirty or clean, are run through the same process.”

Although I fell somewhat short of the graduating point, I went far enough to discover that this great research-academy for bodily ailments is not devoid of interest for those of boundless patience and physical endurance, who have a penchant for scientific exploration. It is a tremendous human dissecting organization which runs with the precision of clockwork and is fed daily by hundreds of recruits from every state in the union and every civilized country on earth. It is the Mecca for thousands of people who enjoy searching their systems for the seat of some indefinite, unlocatable disorder, either real or imaginary, and for all such persons it must be a satisfying resort, since it provides every known mechanism and device for exploring, testing and tormenting the human anatomy. And those who survive the entire course have the recompense of knowing they have been thoroughly castor-oiled and overhauled.

After much persuasion on my part, and many expressions of surprise and regret on the part of the diagnostician, I finally succeeded in arranging an appointment with the chief urologist for the next day. From the appointed time I waited two or three hours, expecting the while to get a reprimand for my stubbornness; but to my surprise the distinguished Doctor Braasch greeted me as cordially as if he were going to present me with a diploma of good health and a magna cum laude degree for good behavior. Though his geniality appeared to lack nothing in sincerity, I had a strange presentiment that he had something “up his sleeve”; and with some anxiety I inquired what my examinations and blood tests had disclosed. At this his countenance became grave. So did mine.

THE SHOCKING DISCOVERY

After going hurriedly through a collection of “reports” lying before him on the desk he rendered his opinion in this-wise: The summing up of all the reports--as far as my examinations had extended--led to the discovery that my trouble was located in my left kidney!

I was on the point of making some jaunty remark about their having wasted a lot of time and labor in finding out what I had told them at the beginning, when he showed me the X-ray pictures, revealing a condition of the kidney which called for an operation. This discovery having been made in my first examination, all the others seemed a mere waste of time and effort. But I was less disturbed about past events than I was over the prospects of the future. The suggestion of an operation, coming unexpectedly, gave me a queer jolt, not easily described. It seemed more like a bad dream than a reality. Without the remotest idea that any such action would be necessary I had made my plans to return East in a few days; and having felt no pain or inconvenience for more than a month it was impossible to adjust myself to the thought of an operation. A man with a violent toothache has a lessened dread of the dentist; and a griping pain in the midriff or in the appendix quarter mitigates the terror of seeing the doctor; but for a fellow in perfectly good health and spirits to go voluntarily and submit himself to being cut open is quite another matter.

When I reported the verdict to my family, to my utter amazement they seemed not in the least surprised; indeed they were somewhat jubilant that it was no worse. My suggestion to put off the operation till I could think it over met with a storm of protest; the whole family party were of one voice in declaring that as long as it had to be done sometime it must be done immediately while I was in good health. They would all stay with me, play with me, and keep me constantly amused. With the late scientific discoveries in surgery, all contributing to the safety and comfort of the patient, there was nothing to worry about. In short, after the first shock it would be a regular outing for me. One might have supposed they were trying to inveigle me into going to a circus or a football game. Their arguments were seconded and supported by a man we had met at the hotel, who chimed in with the joyful news that he had just been through a similar operation and although, minus one kidney, he never enjoyed such good health in all his life. Without wishing him the least harm, I almost regretted that he felt so well.

We talked with the chief urologist, who joined enthusiastically in their cheerful persuasions; but somehow I couldn’t seem to fall in with their light-hearted view of things. It’s remarkable what a trifling matter an operation is--to the other fellow. They all seemed to regard the act of cutting me open as being no more serious than that of manicuring a broken fingernail.

Any married man knows how difficult it is to hold his own against the arguments of _one_ woman; and to stand out against a whole bevy of them requires a species of fortitude of which no normal man is possessed. Being hopelessly in the minority, both as to numbers and argumentative force, I appealed to Doctor Braasch and asked if the operation couldn’t be postponed a few months or a year without endangering my health. For a moment he seemed to weaken slightly in favor of the losing side, and admitted that it probably could; but the women insisted that it couldn’t. Having made up their minds there was going to be an operation, they would hear to nothing else, and declared that I was only delaying the performance with needless discussion.

I said, “I don’t want any operation; that isn’t what I came here for.”

My wife said, “Maybe you didn’t know it, but that’s exactly what you did come here for. I know a lot of things that you know nothing about. And it’s much better you shouldn’t know.”

She had kept in touch with my diagnostician, and I wondered if he had initiated her into some of the clinical secrets in order to punish me for insubordination. I didn’t ask what it was she knew, nor did it make much difference. Whatever a woman may know, it does not alter the fact that she wants what she wants. And if her wants call for no more than the loss of a kidney, it’s easier to accommodate her than it is to oppose her wishes. Therefore, with the family and the clinical staff arrayed against me there wasn’t much use arguing. Nobody supported my side: I was like a lone defendant facing a “packed” jury, solid for conviction.

The women were convinced that it was such a trivial affair, that they all wished they could take the job off my hands. They were astonished that under the circumstances I should be so obstinate in refusing this opportunity of having Doctor Will Mayo operate on me. The result was, I was made to feel more like a slacker than a hero. What a pity it is, I thought, that those who like such things cannot have their tastes gratified! I wished the kidney would kick up again so I could get thoroughly sore and disgusted with it; but it lay there as quiet as a mouse in the corner--as if it heard what was going on. I could almost hear it whisper, “Stick to your guns, old pal, I’ll be a good kidney in future.” But in a moment of weakness I asked the doctor how long it would take.

“It means only ten days to two weeks in bed and one more to convalesce. Yes, Doctor ‘Will’ can operate on you day after tomorrow morning.” That settled it. At four o’clock the next afternoon, with the mercury thirty below zero, my family accompanied me to the hospital.

“ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE--”

Have you ever been left at a strange hospital in the afternoon or evening of a cold, gloomy day, to be prepared for an operation early next morning? It starts the goose flesh on me even now when I recall seeing the door close behind my family as they left the room when the visitors’ hours were over. I was alone--and lonesome. Here is where the stern realities of life press down hard upon you and you call in all the reserves of your courage to meet them. It is a case where a fellow is almost justified in feeling sorry for himself. I felt as I imagine poor old Philoctetes must have felt when his companions sailed away and abandoned him on the deserted Island of Lemnos, there to nurse his snake-bitten ankle in painful solitude. I was even worse off than Philoctetes: I didn’t have so much as a pain to keep me company.

In a few minutes an attractive nurse came in and looked me over with a quick appraising eye.

“I’m to be your day nurse,” she said.

“Thank you,” I said; “I hope you’ll like me.” She said she’d be on duty till seven, and come back at seven in the morning. For my “supper” she said I might have a “light tray”; then she went out. Presently she returned, bringing a tray with a miniature dish of light cereal. That was all the rules permitted me to have. It was carefully concealed beneath a white napkin, probably to keep the aerial bacilli from nesting in it on the way in. When I had eaten it I glanced up with an eager, hungry look, in comparison with which Oliver Twist must have appeared contentedly well fed.

“Next course,” I said, with a maudlin attempt at facetiousness.

She shook her head. “You’ve had all the rules allow. I’m sorry, but--”

“But you’re not sorry enough to give me any more--is that it?”

“Your next course will be castor oil.”

“But I’ve already had it--bottles of it!” I protested. “It’s all they’ve fed me the past ten days.” That made no difference; the orders called for it, and there was no alternative but to take it.

“I _hate_ the damn stuff!--Haven’t you some substitute?” I pleaded.

“There is no substitute,” she said with an air of finality that closed the argument.

She removed the tray, then set to work getting me ready for the night. She unfastened my shoes, took them off, unbuttoned me and shunted me into a suit of hospital pajamas, as if I were already an invalid. It was hours before my usual bedtime, but I made no protest. In fact my powers of opposition had been worn down to a point where it no longer seemed worth while objecting to anything. Once before I had been in a hospital a few days and learned my lesson in submissiveness. In a hospital one soon learns to obey everybody, for every attendant, even down to the meanest orderly, is clothed with an authority not to be questioned by any invalid intruder. A man may be a czar in his own home (that is, if he’s single), but let him fall into the clutches of the doctors, nurses and hospital authorities and he becomes the most humble milk-fed subject on earth. The moment he undertakes to assert himself he is sure to run afoul of some iron-clad rule, and like a captive bird beating its head against the bars of its cage he learns the utter futility of resistance.

I lay there trying to chirk up my spirits by contemplating the future joys of convalescence--when a fellow can sit up in an easy chair with a consciousness of restored sovereignty over himself; when he can fearlessly declare his mind and tell them all to go to the--but just then the nurse reminded me it was seven o’clock, and she was leaving for the night. She surprised me by saying the _barber_ would soon be in.

“But I haven’t sent for any barber--I don’t want one.”

“No, but that’s all been arranged for you. Good night.” And out she went.

It all reminded me of the newspaper accounts where we read of people being fed, shaved and groomed for hanging or electrocution at daybreak, except that they don’t have to take castor oil; and they are always given plenty to eat.

Shortly after the nurse left the barber arrived. He unwrapped his kit and took out an old-fashioned razor. “I’ve come to shave you.”

“Thank you, but I’m not an invalid, and I always shave myself.”

“Yes--your face--but that ain’t where they’re goin’ to operate,” he laughed. He cupped his palms and blew his breath on them.--“I’ll have to thaw the frost out of these joints before I can hold a razor.”