Indian Doctors

I went to get all my assorted checkups done earlier this week. With specialists that is. And it was quite an eye-opening (hyok hyok) experience, and one that has only served to increase my faith in Indian doctors and my sense of well-being around them. I guess Ive just been very lucky that I havent had any bad experiences or false reports with any of them, and that those Ive met have excellent hands. The kind of hands that musicians or artists should have - the artists that doctors really should be, soft, prodding, unintrusive, warm, sensitive. Hands that care about their work and are fulfilling a duty to God.

First I went to get my retina checked my means of eye dilation. If you have myopia, it is recommended that you go for a dilation every couple of years past the age of 20 or so, and every year past 40. This is because in the case of myopia, or shortsightedness, the light doesnt reach the back of the eye and so the retina has to stretch to be able to accomodate this lack of vision and thus can be liable to tear. The entire process takes about 30-45 minutes, as eyedrops are put in your eye about 3 times, once every 5 or so minutes to make them dilate. Its fascinating, the process. I looked in the mirror a couple of times and saw my eyes become darker, expanding like a blob of oil or a Scottish lake on a moonless night, oozing ever outward. You know your eyes dilate when you're in love right? Dilated eyes make you look more desirable apparently. I wonder how much dilation my fiance gets to see. I myself am personally fascinated by the journey his pupils make within their assigned boundaries.

Then a light is flashed into your eye (and you know, from 10th std biology, that pupils constrict in glare, so thats why dilation was necessary), and your retina is checked though your pupil. Its like a window opens up into an invisible dimension just beyond the bounds of normality, MOST fascinating. In fact, just the day before when I went with my mother I had stared in morbid fascination at the charts that enumerated all the things that could possibly go wrong with your eye and lenses - inflamed conjunctiva, nasty growths within the eye, bacteria on soft lenses, squirming about ewwwwww. Man Im so glad I decided to abandon my brief affair with 2 week soft lenses! It really wasnt less painful than semi-soft lenses. In fact, it afforded me other types of trouble. With semi soft, you KNOW when there's dust in your eye and when it moves... its hurts liek HELL and your eyes start to water. Trouble with soft lenses is of a more sneaky sort. My soft lens started clouding up in the shower, and started irritating a bit, and in 2 weeks i had to remove and clean and reinsert them more often in terms of ratio than ive ever had to do with semisoft lenses. They would randomly turn in the eye, and maybe my eye was just goddamn small for them to fit, because i had to literally pull my eye open with the other hand wwhile trying to manoeuvre the lens into my eye. Requires dexterity, let me tell you. Or maybe I just got a faulty pair. I dont know. But this was all because i dropped my semisoft lens down the drain in Vegas in June and didnt have a spare pair and had to get tested and get one in New York. If i had only remembered my spare pair I wouldnt have had to waste 150 dollars on a checkup and prescription.

But the checkup was quite cool. They use different machines from those Im familiar with in Bombay. The one I remember is for checking peripheral vision, in which u have to mention the number of times u see a vibration around the screen. This Ive never had checked in Bombay. here its the alphabets and the red and green circles and a pattern or picture that moves back and forth into and out of focus. Anyway. My doctor still rocks because she is pretty and smart and has a super figure for her age and is calm and reassuring and friendly and has the gentlest hands and infinite patience and told me i have lovely eyes. (Not true by Indian standards but still!)

Then I went to the gynaecologist. Now Ive had somewhat extensive experience with gynacs due to period issues etc ever since I was a tween, and this lady is my favourite one in Bombay. Ive dealt with women who, though erudite and well-known, are like village midwives when it comes to speaking about the female body, pragmatic and matter of fact, and veering on the unsympathetic side, who unceremoniously shove their fingers into you and prod about like theyre prospecting for diamonds or a patch of arable land while you sit there, your feet suspended in those disgraceful stirrups, not knowing whether to laugh at the ridiculousness or your vulnerable position (that came much later when my sense of irony developed), or to cry at this indignity inflicted upon your virgin self, like female rape, except its with fingers and your mom took you and it hurts and the room is dingy and not at all reassuring. This is a doctor's for Chrissakes! You have just graduated from the golden Paeiatrician period of adorable waiting rooms filled with storybooks and chubby-cheeked children smiling beatifically in the knowledge that they are free from hepatitis A or whatever. and into... this? Bleak House come alive. And slowly you start to realise that maybe adulthood isnt all its cut out to be - that makeup will soon become a chore and your body a burden.

anyway. Another gynac I met was very famous, had a huge clinic, all nicely wooded and everything. But what a cold unfeeling woman. No emotion on her face whatsoever. My mom had her sonography done with her male associate who was so much more chatty and kind. Then I resolved that i wanted a male gynac, that to some degree they would be more sympathetic. (Too much so, if you see the tragicomic Richard Gere move Dr. T and his Women). She was all about hysterectomy like it was the most normal thing in the world, and not a loaded suggestion as it is for most women, who derive their sexual identity from their ability to bear children. of course, now i have become more practical about this matter, and that some organ that doesnt bear kids anymore is not worth the suffering and its consequential lifestyle adjustments it demands in women who already have much on their plates physically and emotionally.

But this one I went to, Dr. Bhada, is superb. A short clipped Parsi woman with boycut hair and a much-powdered face, and the dark pink/red lipstick that only women with their heydays in the '80s, such as my mother can carry off without looking tarty. Everything about her spells compact and efficient, but with the cultured soft edge and hint of tehzeeb that is only found in educated Parsis and ancient Allahabadi gentlemen, in different degrees and manifestation of course. She chatted with me while I laid down in that ridiculous position, and she was so gentle that I was slightly embarassed to remove my clothes, (can it be that I am becoming inhibited after my recent handover of my supposed modesties to the permanent keeping of a man?). Her fingers were gentle and unobtrusive, not intent on digging out my ovaries but almost moulding my insides back into shape the way one might firm a beloved lump of clay solicitously with cupped hands. We chatted about America and how its drastically changed since 9/11, and about how I dont feel as lucky anymore to be moving there. She was reassuring and professional at the same time. It was just calming.

Then I went for a blood test. My first ever alone. At Cumballa Hill Hospital. Its quite an efficient place I must say, cosy and quick. Going to Breach Candy Hospital for anything is traumatic, involves long hot lines, traipsing down corridors and an air of hustle and disorganisation like an airport or train platform, except its white. At Cumballa, where the pathology lab is open 24 hours, all is quiet and muted. I was in and out in 15 minutes. Most pleasant and fuss free. And it felt empowering to go to the hospital alone. Not to need anyone, though I dont guarantee Ill feel that way when Im older or ill or dreading the results. It wasnt the cavernous wayside inn of death and bureaucracy the way it had seemed when I was younger, but a dim chapel to the wounded body and spirit.

Then I went to a dermatologist and venereal (what a dirty word. Sounds like craterlike pink sunspot pimples on a sickening vomity yellow-green surface) services specialist for some corns on my foot - unfortunate byproducts ofsharing a public school floor with numerous dance students and God knows who else, unsterilised pedicure instruments, and unknown infected people. And I have returned super paranoid. The human body is so fascinating! Made up of all these tiny parts that fit together so beautifully and work like clockwork and sometimes fume sulphurpously in protest when you dont oil it adequately and rust when you dont use it. But still, the maintenance involved! The danger of wear and tear and exposure to external elements! What happens when it falls apart and becomes an obsolete shivering mess of wobbly/bony cells without meaning or function!

Shit. I really respect God or the Cosmic Spirit and evolution and biology for this amazing home of our spirits, and doctors for attempting the painstaking task of keeping it all together. I returned home, tired but relieved, at the end of an enlightening day, that also cautioned me that tomorrow is never the same as today, and that our relationship with our body is lifelong and as painful and rewarding as we make it, requiring as much commitment as we give our jobs or relationships, and equally, as frustrating!