I went back to tell the chiefs about this on Thursday and they said they’d have to talk with the higher-ups before they could give me an official response. I got a call on Friday from Mike Miller’s secretary, setting up a meeting for tomorrow. It looks like I finally got some action! After all this time, I finally figured out how to get things done around here. It’s too bad everything has to be done through threats, though.
Wednesday, May 14, 1986
On Monday I met with Mike Miller about my maternity leave. He was very nice about the whole thing. First, he hugged me and told me how happy he was to hear the news. He seemed really sincere about it. Then he told me how upset he had been when he found out what the chiefs had tried to do to me. He said that in our program, we’ve always been very liberal about maternity leave. He went into a whole lecture about how we as pediatricians were supposed to be advocates not only for children but for their parents as well and how it would be hypocritical for us not to allow the residents proper time to be with their newborns. He was being nice to me, so I didn’t start up with him about breast feeding and how it was hypocritical that none of us could ever breast-feed our children because we weren’t provided with the proper facilities to ensure its success. Anyway, he told me he would guarantee that I got at least two months of leave after the baby was born and that I’d have easy rotations both the month before I was due and the month I came back after the baby was born.
Mike’s always been nice to me, and I think he really meant what he said. I don’t think he was saying those things just to try to prevent me from filing a grievance with the union . So I’m going to take his word for it. I’m going to trust him and I’m not going to speak to anyone from the union , at least not until next year’s schedule comes out at the beginning of June. But you can be sure, if two months of leave are not written into that schedule for November and December, I am going to be on the phone to the CIR so fast it’ll make your head spin!
I was a little distracted when I went in to talk to Mike because I’ve been really worried about my father. I called him on Sunday night and right near the end of this very nice conversation, he happened to mention to me that he had passed some bright red blood with a stool earlier in the day. Just like that, very matter-of-factly he said it. I immediately got upset and I asked him what he was going to do about it. He said, “Nothing.”
I almost went crazy! He always does this to me. I yelled at him that he had to go to see a doctor the next day, and if he wasn’t going to make an appointment, I would call his doctor and make the appointment and then come out to New Jersey and drive him to the doctor’s office to make sure he got there. I think he got the message because he said he’d try to make the appointment but told me that his doctor was a very busy man and he might not be able to get to see him for weeks.
Anyway, right after I came out of Mike’s office, I called my father at work. He said he had been able to make an appointment for this morning. He called a little while ago to tell me that the doctor had seen him, had done a full examination including a sigmoidoscopy [an examination of the sigmoid portion of the large intestine], and that the bleeding had been due to hemorrhoids. Everything else was fine. So I felt a lot better. My father told me I had made him worry for nothing. I told him that we didn’t know it was nothing until we checked it out. It might have been something, and if he had ignored it, it might have cost him his life.
The doctor did tell my father that he did have to have the hemorrhoids removed as soon as possible because there was a possibility that there could be massive bleeding. He said he could arrange for the surgery to be done next Monday, and amazingly my father agreed; he’s not admitting it, but he must either be in a lot of pain or really be scared about this. Whatever it is that’s causing it, I’m glad he’s acting so reasonably about it. But now I have to try to get next Monday off so I can go out to New Jersey to be with him. It shouldn’t be too much trouble. Then again, you wouldn’t expect it to be too much trouble to get a day off to stay with your baby who has the measles and a fever of 103, would you?
I’ve been feeling better over the past few days. My nauseousness is completely gone, and I’m not so tired anymore. I think I’ve made it through the worst part of this pregnancy. When I was pregnant with Sarah, once I made it through the initial yucky part, I felt wonderful until about three weeks before I delivered; then I felt like a blimp and couldn’t move at all. So it should be smooth sailing for me over the next few months. There’s only one more month of this internship left. I haven’t enjoyed most of this year; maybe I’ll be able to salvage this last part of it.