Me, Medicinewoman
Jun 22nd, 2007 by Terry
What’s in a name?
You could be called Terry, if you were me.
My husband calls me babe, or beebe if he’s feeling cute; my son calls me Mom, and also Terrold, although I’m not sure of the origin of that one, but I respond to either one. My mom, may her soul rest in peace, used to call me Temmela, a term of endearment. I’m Cool Aunt Terry to all of my nieces and nephews.
All of my friends call me Ter.
At the supermarket, when I spilled all of my change out of my wallet while looking for my credit card, the bag boy called me Hey lady, as in “Hey lady, one of your quarters rolled over here.” Thanks, kid.
Some of my patients call me NURSE! in capital letters with italic and exclamation mark emphasis, because they think they will get my attention that way. Mostly, my patients call me by my name and that’s just fine by me.
I was once called “head” by a physician, as in “Hey head, how much I.V. fluid did the patient get for this appendectomy?” Huh? You talkin’ to me? I guess he called me head because I stand and work at the head of the bed, but maybe I was giving this guy the benefit of the doubt.
But last night was the best. I was on call and working in OB, putting in epidurals and helping to birth babies. Epidurals cool the savage beast of pain that is labor, and most of the women I take care of there are in the throes of it when my help is summoned. I have heard and have been called every imaginable expletive (of which I shall not enumerate here) before the epidural is inserted, and then thanked ever so kindly after the labor pains miraculously disappear. It’s more than okay; I’ve been there, done that.
This morning, as I was leaving the OB unit after my call shift last night, one of my patient’s family members was standing at the door.
“There she goes,” purred the lady, as I walked by her, smiling. “She’s the medicinewoman.”
Sometimes it’s the little things in life, but that family member really made my day.
What a cool thing to be called!
I’m glad that you started blogging and a link to your site will be put up on mine. I think maybe you gave the doc a liitle too much of a pass at the head crack.
Hi Terry,
You’ve got a very good blog started here. Thanks for the link and the nice email. I appreciate the kind words of encouragement.
As a fairly new blogger myself, I know how important it is to get links from other bloggers so that you can start to build a readership. I will gladly add you to my blogroll and I hope it brings you a ton of traffic.
Also, I’m looking forward to reading more of your posts.
- Dean
Head?? He called you “head”????
I think he must have lost his…. : D
I’ve heard some wierd names before, but that takes the perverbial head
God, it’s late. I meant that “takes the proverbial CAKE”.
See, I had “head” on the brain….
Question….
When I had the last colonscopy with polyp removal, I was given propofol and ketamine….then versed….by the head of the anesthesia department (MD). I have an intolerance for all of the Benzos, and had talked to this man prior to another procedure about my concern about being given versed in particular, and benzo’s in general. The intolerance is well documented. How to keep this from continuing to occur????
yeah, havn’t we all been called “anesthesia”. I brought this up the other day. I have been at this hospital for 4 years. I decided to put a quizzen on every surgeon I had that day. I keep thier patiens alive for 4 years and they don’t know my name. “anesthesia” they say, hmmmm. its a big joke now and they call me anesthesia in the hall way and I respond with. “ent”, or “general surgery”.
guess its fair.