Dr. Butterfield

Today I went to the doctor. Not the ear, nose, throat doctor, but the "other" doctor. Yup. It's been 5 years since my last pap. I'm not going to go any further on that. I am writing about something altogether different that happened while at the doctors.

First, my regular (if you can call him regular when I haven't even seen him for FIVE years) doctor was unavailable, so they assigned me to Dr. Butterfield. Dr. Butterfield is probably in her late 50's or early 60's. She came in, smiled and shook my hand, introducing herself. Already I liked her; I didn't feel self-conscious sitting there naked covered only by my slit up the back "gown". We reviewed basic medical history and she didn't even comment on or chastise me for waiting 5 years to come in. I liked her even more.

As she looked over my chart she was asking questions and then she came to "exercise". I had truthfully written down that I engaged in practically no intentional exercise. To which she said, "I see here that you don't exercise." She said it with the same tone of voice as if she was saying, "I see here that you have two kids;" Nothing accusatory or insinuating.

I responded, "Not recently. I go in spurts".
Dr. Butterfield, "Okay, here you go" (handing me a sheet of paper), "You need to exercise 30 min a day, 6 days a week. This is the minimum required level of activity."

She went on to explain that 20 minutes of that needs to be in my target heart range, showing me how to find that on my handy little sheet of paper she'd given me.

I must have nodded or said something because she then said, "Okay, what's next?" and went on to my calcium intake. The calcium conversation followed a similar pattern.

The entire exchange was carried on in a manner that suggested she fully expected that not only was I on board with this whole exercise thing, but that it was a novel and exciting prospect to me. Not that she talked down to me, just very expectantly. I almost felt like laughing, and acquiescing. "Okay doc, I'll do it. 30 min/day, 6 days/wk. target heart rate – 20 minutes. No problem."

So anyway, now I've got to go. I need to get in 30 minutes before I go to bed.