Monday Musings 4-3-23-Oops, he did it again!

This musing may seem a bit… unhinged.

What the hell is up to my husband’s uncanny calling of surgical cases, especially call cases?

Yesterday, when I was preparing for my Sunday afternoon nap that I take in case I get called into the OR in the middle of the night and still have to show up for my research assistant gig at the university on Mondays, he mentioned that he felt like there was a big belly case in the wind. Or an ectopic. Or both.

And there was a big belly case at 2100. Just when I started my call shift.

Of course, there was.

I got home and in bed at 0115. Never mind that I have to get up at 0545 in order to pack my lunch and his lunch, shower, and get myself on the road to the university by 0630.

And, of course, my brain went off at 0300. For no other reason than to remind me that I had to get up in two hours.

There is much to unpack here. I’m not sure if he is jealous that am no longer “working hard”, AKA all the hours that are, and wants to be an asshole about it. Or if he knows I love work and am a workaholic (recovering) and he just wants me to have something I enjoy. For example, a case.

But there is definitely something woo-woo about his ability to divine the cases out there and pull one of them down for me to do on call.

He does frequently mention that I am beloved by the surgeons because I get shit done. And he does acknowledge that sometimes they wait for me to be on call so they don’t have to wait forever on an emergent case while someone else does the pre-op checklist. This does happen. Or the glee with which a surgeon approaches me and is visibly pleased that I am, in fact, on call that night.

Once would be a coincidence, two would be odd, but this happens every damned month. Ectopics, lap appies, big bellies, bleeders of all sorts, the surgeon he doesn’t care for because I don’t care for them, called them all at one time or another.

In fact as we were just about to make incision on last night’s big belly, after the pause, and while I was doing the plugging of things, and as I was pouring the irrigation fluid I mentioned it to the team. And the surgeon and the tech turned to me and asked “Again!?!” Because they had heard me complain about this in the past. And the surgeon remarked, matter of factly, “Tell your husband to shut up”

Oh, Dr. Blank, I have. And I will.