World Class Runs

[Below: There will be no pictures for this post. You are welcome.]

[Date & Place: The 3rd or 4th week of November 1957, a few hundred miles west of North America.]

After a day of puking and running around with Diana, I was starting to feel well again. That night I developed the worst diarrhea of my life. Again, the deity hated me. It lasted three days. I was afraid to leave the cabin.

By the third day it was getting clear it wasn't getting better, I was getting dehydrated, and I needed medical care. My Mother took me to the ship's doctor.

She did what she would always do when I saw a doctor: hang in the office, ignoring hints from the doctor that he and I could continue without her. He told her he would have to do a rectal exam, and she just sat there. He finally told her she had to wait outside. She started to freak out. She said, "I have to be here! I don't know what you're going to do! This is my baby!"

He said, "You don't have to worry; the nurse will be with me the whole time."

She still wouldn't leave, so he took her arm and pushed her out the door and slammed it.

It was easy for me to figure out what was really happening. Mom thought that during the rectal exam I might say something like, "That's just like Mommy does it." She wasn't trying to protect me, she was looking out for herself. She relied on being there to be able to ad lib a dismissal of anything I said that might incriminate her.

The doctor found a cyst that was causing the diarrhea. I had to use some medicated suppositories for the next few days. They worked great and I was out and about within 24 hours.