Ode to the bladder

Two stories along the same trail tonight, kiddos. One made me think of the other.

1) Somebody pinch me!
The other night I had this bizarre dream. Well, not that bizarre. Just barely past reality. In this dream I was in clinic, and a patient's (adult) daughter was distraught about her mother's pain and how it limited her self-care and how it was just such a drain on her (the daughter) to take care of her (the mother) and couldn't I just please give her mother something for the pain? Like hydrocodone? And the whole time I was trying to tell her how badly I needed to pee and that if she would just let me go I'd come right back and listen to whatever she had to say. But she just kept talking and tried to follow me into the bathroom, and it was terrible. And then I finally woke up and had to pee really, really badly.

2) Boundaries
That dream made me think about this... As a med student, you are trained to follow your resident everywhere. If he/she sees you trailing along, he/she a) knows you're working b) might let you see/do something cool and c) is less likely to forget to send you home at the end of the day. So you just get into this habit of getting up whenever your resident does and following him/her down the hall. Well I've never followed anyone into the bathroom nor been followed myself, but I know people who have. So even though it may seem awkward to you, it's not uncommon (and I do it myself) to announce to your med students when the next stop is the potty. And this latest crop has been really eager beavers, so I've even taken to giving them a play-by-play of where I'm headed in clinic, when I'll be back to the workroom, and whether they need to come. Because if I don't broadcast that I'm simply going to the printer and then to drop the paper off with the scheduler, they'll get up and follow me down the hall like a little brood of ducklings. And there's just not a lot of medical learning to be had during a trip to the printer. So now you understand if when we're together, I ever stand up and proclaim, "I'm just going to the bathroom. You don't need to follow me." It's because I'm just going to the bathroom, and you don't need to follow me.