to be a doctor in a small town...

My dad was 50 years old when he was diagnosed with cancer, a rare incurable cancer that would take his life five short months later.  The doctor that diagnosed him was the same man who attended local football games rushing onto the field every time one of our hometown heroes went down under the Friday night lights.  This doctor was the same man who according to my father saved my mother after giving birth to my older brother in 1981. 

When my father died, I was four months pregnant with my first child, just starting to swell and lose my shape.  Six months later, I had labored and pushed 20 hours when they told me to stop, my baby was in distress and that I would have an emergency cesarean section (which would turn out to be the first of many figurative and l am sure literal middle fingers we’d get as parents).  My dad’s doctor was the on-call surgeon that night and after comforting my terrified mother, he pulled a boy from my body who would have his Grandpa’s name….making me a mother, giving me hope and making the sky a bit bluer for our whole family.  I will never forget that, not just because I became a mother that night but because a man just doing his job had truly woven himself into the fabric of our family.  I am certain this is not something that is uncommon for him, a small town doctor who has treated generations, burying and birthing families along the way.  However, that in no way diminishes the role he’s played in our family. 

Five years later, my second child was born late on a Saturday night again via cesarean section.  Again, the man who even though he has ushered both of my sons screaming into this world will forever be referred to as my dad’s doctor arrived after a day of motorcycling and delivered another son into my husband’s waiting arms.  Before he left, he ducked under the curtain that separated me from the carnage of a c-section birth and said, “he’s a perfect baby boy,” to which I replied, “thank you for taking such good care of my family all of these years.”  He patted my head, gave a slight smile and said, “You’ve been a great family to take care.” To be the patient of a doctor in a small town.