Better Sight

I have lots of strange bumps on my face that I have regularly checked. But I had forgotten the one on my eyelid last checkup which has been growing and growing at an alarming pace. I couldn't really open my eye completely any more, so I was sort of half-squinting, Jolly Roger-like, all the time.

But I put off going to the doctor's, figuring that if I went to the skin doctor they would send me to the eye doctor, and vice versa. But since WiseMan was headed to the skin doctor today (Saturday! She now has office hours on Saturday!), I tagged along to see if I could slip in. As a private patient in Germany these days, one is always welcome in any doctor's office, as they can bill your for the complete costs, not just get a small sum like with the insurance schemes. I, of course, have to pay the bills first, and then fight the insurance company (4 weeks delay until recompensation) and the public servant's Beihilfe (currently as *6* months) to recover most of the money.

I got in rather fast, and yes indeed it was a soft fibroma (there is a picture on Wikipedia that could be me) and she would take it out right now. Right now? Oh, and we can't use anesthetics, but she will just pluck it up and give it a little snip. Gulp. I *hate* anyone near my eyes, my eye doctor despairs of getting the pressure measured on my eyeballs every year.

So I lay down, she was chattering away trying to calm me, took the scissors and needed two painful snips. Blotting away the blood she saw another little piece, so we had to have a third snip. It took a bit for the bleeding to stop, can't put a band-aid on, so I sat in the waiting room listening to the telephone calls people were conducting in public until it quit bleeding. It hurt like hell.

But upon getting outside I noticed two things: It was much lighter out (as I wasn't squinting) and everything was sharply in focus. So why didn't I get this done months ago? The eyelid is now turning a nice shade of purple, I'll put on lipstick to match this evening, hope it heals by Tuesday, when I'm giving a talk in England.