Getting OLD...

I realized something during a session yesterday: I am getting OLD. When I started med school, every patient I took care of was older than me, except when I did pediatrics, obviously. Through ob/gyn (since I was at a fancy private hospital, there were no pregnant teeny boppers), medicine (hello! Tons of old people), surgery (hello! More old people, if not really old, definitely oldER.) There was even a family that thought I was a candy striper when I was on-call overnight.

As a resident, most patients were still older than me. However, lately, in my private practice, I had an influx of young people. People born in the 80's. EIGHTY'S. Man, that makes me feel old. I used to think that people in their 20's were 'my age.' But no more. These are practically children! Pretty soon, I think I will only be taking care of people younger than me. Eventually, I ought to complete a fellowship in geriatric psychiatry just so that I could be the 'younger' one.

I am probably going to look like this soon.



And to delay the natural process of aging, I thought I would go exercise. After sweating it out on a stair climber, I needed to take a shower to be presentable for the rest of my day. I wrapped myself in these teeny tiny towels they have at my gym, and headed to the shower. I saw this young lady who was shaving in the shower, and I thought, "Wow, that is really productive, work out and shave. Maybe I should do that sometime." As I walked closer, the young woman exclaimed, "Hello! Dr. Insert-My-Name!" I said, "Hello! Insert-Her-Name! How are you?" Then chit chatting ensued. I excused myself and pulled the curtain closed around me. (The gym has both open and private showers, she was in the open section.) Then I thought about staying there FOREVER, until she was gone. But alas, I gotta get back to work!

Thankfully, this patient had been one of my favorite patients, bright, insightful, compliant, and most of all, did you notice, she greeted me with my proper title! If only she didn't see me practically naked.