An Eye for an Eye

            This is not a blog about personal, intimate information.  Honest.  So, Men, stay with me here, because you are going to be represented in high style if you keep reading.

I recently had a “female” procedure.  Women, you will have no qualms about this story because we can meet a stranger in the elevator who asks us for a tampon and suddenly we’re all about helping and hormones and hugs.  A man will not tell his own brother so much as his underwear size, but we share nursing tips, hot flash remedies, and mini-pads with women we met two seconds ago.

            Cutting to the chase, my OB thought I should have gone through menopause by now, and suggested an outpatient surgery that could help it along.  Did you know there was such a thing?  It’s called an ablation and, had anyone suggested it to me 15 years ago, I would have been all over it.  So thanks for that one, medical team. 

Simply put, they use lasers and other instruments to destroy the uterine lining.  This is a great thing if you’re through having kids yet still have heavy periods.  In half the cases, you get catapulted gleefully into menopause.  At the very worst, you have lighter periods, so it’s a win-win.  Bob lost no time asking when I was going to be “obliterated.”  

            Naturally, since you go under anesthetic for it, there are pre-op tests and pre-op appointments. In the last one, the doctor said to me, “Now I just have to tell you this.  There’s a small chance I could puncture the wall of your uterus, and if that happens, you’ll need further surgery.  However, it’s not very likely, it hardly ever happens, and I really wouldn’t worry about it.”  But of course.  The standard warning to prevent law suits.

            So I go home and casually mention this to Bob.  Bob looks at me and says, “Next time you see him, tell him that if he punctures my wife’s uterus there’s a small chance I could come over and beat the crap out of him.  But tell him it’s not very likely, it hardly ever happens, and I really wouldn’t worry about it.” 

            And that is why men don’t share intimate information in elevators.