Black Mold and Other Skin Conditions

I think I have a pretty good sense of humor. In fact, other people have actually told me that I do. In school, I was sort of the class clown, always making some kind of wise crack. I'm sure I was the type of student that teachers don't exactly relish. I mean, I was a good student, but I had this habit of making comments on pretty much everything. I suppose I still do, otherwise, why would I be writing a blog on the strange things that happen in my life.

So, a few weeks ago, I was combing my hair. I don't know exactly how I managed to do it, but I saw what looked like a small black spot on my scalp. Now, think about that. First of all, how many times have you seen a spot on your scalp? This is not on my face or near my hairline. It is actually on my scalp about two inches into my hair. Anyway, I couldn't quite figure out what it was or how it had gotten there, so I tried to look at it in a magnifying mirror. That really didn't help, so I asked my husband to look at it and he agreed that it was a black spot.

Black doesn't seem to be the natural color for spots on human skin, so I became a little concerned. I decided to try to get an appointment with a dermatologist. I don't know how things work where you live, but getting an appointment with a dermatologist in my area is not easy. It seems like the "first opening" in their appointment book is the twelfth of never. But, I managed to get an appointment fairly quickly - two weeks away from the date I had called. I thought I would just go to my regular family doctor first and let him look at my spot, and, if he thought I needed to see a dermatologist, at least I would already have an appointment.

The funny thing about getting this appointment was that I had tried to call this dermatologist's office and got a recording saying that they were closed and I should call back within their regular business hours of 8:30am - 5:00pm. Color me stupid, but I thought 3:30pm was between those hours. I went to their web site and there was an option to make an appointment online. I love those kinds of things. My vet has one and it works like a charm. So, I found the first opening, clicked on it and filled in all my information. I was told I would get a confirmation of my appointment "shortly". Well, by the next afternoon, when I still had not gotten a confirmation, I called the office, only to get a recording saying they were closed again. I finally kept pushing buttons on the phone until a real person answered.

I told the appointment clerk that I wanted to confirm the appointment I had made for 1:15pm on August 9th. She said they didn't show a record of any appointment for me on that date, but they could get me in at 2:45pm on that same day. I took it. The next morning, I got an email confirmation telling me that my appointment for August 9th had been changed to 11:00am. I was a bit confused, so, I called again. This time the lady told me that there was no way I could have an appointment at 11:00am because the doctor always did surgeries at that time. She confirmed that my appointment was still at 2:45pm. I mentioned that it was terribly confusing to try to make an appointment with them using their online system. She told me I should never use that system, that it didn't work correctly, and I should just call the office to make an appointment. I pointed out to her that I had indeed tried to call the office to make an appointment but got their recording telling me that they were closed when it was really during the time of day that they should have been open. I suggested that maybe more than the online system wasn't working correctly. I'm not sure she appreciated that last comment.

Two days later, I got a phone call from the people who run the online appointment system. They said that they noticed that my appointment had been changed. Now, I was really getting confused. Was this the 1:15pm, appointment, the 2:45pm appointment, or the 11:00am appointment that was scheduled during the doctor's surgery hours? I told them the whole incredible story, that their system was messed up, that the people in the doctor's office hated their system and were telling people not to use it, and that my vet's office had an online appointment system that worked perfectly fine. They apologized for the "inconvenience" and asked if they could send me a $20.00 gift card to Amazon.com. Well, now they were speaking my language. I told them they certainly could send me a gift card. Amazon is my favorite place to shop.

I got in to see my regular doctor three days after I called for an appointment As I was waiting in the exam room, I was glancing around the room and trying to occupy my time with something other than falling asleep on the exam table. I try not to do that because those tables are so narrow that I know I would probably roll over and fall onto the floor. That would be a bit embarrassing, and might hurt too. But, I would be in a doctor's office, so that would be OK. Finally, the doctor came in and greeted me. Then, he told me that I had been the source of entertainment in their office all week long. This puzzled me because, even though I have a good sense of humor and I can make wisecracks with the best of them, I had not actually been in his office all week. So, I looked at him with a surprised look on my face, and said, "Oh, really? How is that?" He said, "Well, when you called in for your appointment, the appointment clerk wrote down that you wanted to come in to see me because of black MOLD that you had on your skin." Really! Are you kidding me! Someone in a doctor's office actually thought I had black mold on my skin. This just shows you the caliber of people in the work force today.

The doctor then told her that he didn't treat black mold, but he would be happy to see me anyway. Thank goodness for small favors. I reassured him that it was not black mold, mildew, or anything else in that department. He laughed and said he knew that but couldn't resist the chance to tell me the story. My doctor has a very strange sense of humor. He looked at my black MOLE, and said he didn't think they needed to throw me into the trunk of a car and rush me to a surgeon, but it probably wouldn't be a bad idea to see a dermatologist.

I asked for some names of dermatologists, and the very first one on the list was the one that I had already made an appointment with, so that kind of made me feel good. We spent the rest of the time talking about the pros and cons of the Nook e-reader over the Kindle. I left his office and felt somewhat better and somewhat ill at ease. I guess I had expected him to say, "Oh, that's nothing. Don't even worry about it. I see those black moles all the time."

When the day finally came for my appointment at the dermatologist, I found their office, checked in at the desk, and sat down waiting for them to call me back up so I could fill out all the forms for a new patient. Finally, after about 10 minutes, I walked back up to their desk and told them I was a new patient and didn't they have some forms for me to fill out. There are always forms to fill out in a doctor's office, even if you are not a new patient.

They handed me a clip board with several papers on it and I sat down. These were not the typical new patient forms, but more the type you would fill out if you were updating your chart. In fact, my name, address, phone number and insurance information were already printed on the form. I was a bit confused about that, especially since they had my insurance listed as Aetna and I am on Medicare. I walked up to the desk to ask about this and was told that they had just taken the information off of my old chart. Old chart? I had an old chart? I had never been to this office before. So, I actually said those words out loud: "I have an old chart?" The lady said that I certainly did, and that it was from 2005. What kind of doctor's office keeps files from six years before? They all make you fill out those stupid papers every year when you go in. Then, I remembered I had been to a different dermatologist in a different office in a different location. I hope you are noticing the word "different". So, I asked her, "Well, did you used to be in a different location?" Yes, that was it. They had recently moved and I had somehow managed to come to the same doctor in a new office and I had no idea it was him, because I had actually seen his partner. So, naturally, I wouldn't recognize his name or his address. I had never actually seen this doctor at this office.

I know, by now you are wondering if I'm making all this up. No, I'm not. If you will notice the title of my blog, it's " Life Musings, and other things: My take on life and all its absurdities." This is just one more absurd thing that seems to happen to me. At any rate, I corrected the information on the pre-printed form and sat down to wait to be called back to see this doctor that I had never seen before in an office I had never been to.

Finally, I got called back. I explained to the nurse why I had come. After a few minutes, the doctor came in. I knew he had to be the doctor because she called him Dr. Perez and I had never seen him before. I showed him my black spot and he looked pensive, made a few notes on his handy dandy little tablet computer, measured my spot and finally said, "Well, it's a black mole that we call a Blue Nevus. It's nothing to be concerned about, they are almost always benign. Unless it gets bigger, I will see you in six months to re-check it." He asked me if I had any more spots like this on my head, and I pointed out that it's actually impossible for me to see spots anywhere else on my head and that it was sort of a fluke that I had seen this one at all. He never cracked a smile, but he did agree and said that, usually, bald men have these spots so it's easier for them to see anything like this. He acknowledged that, since I had hair, it might be more difficult. What's this "might", Kemosabe? You try looking at the top or back of your head/scalp. You will be calling me from your orthopedic doctor's office while being fitted for a neck brace because you twisted yourself into a pretzel trying it.

I have found that dermatologists are very strange and rarely have a good sense of humor. I had seen another one years before that told me he couldn't possibly look at everything on every patient's face because he would be in the exam room for too long with each one. I had asked him to look at a rather large mole right below my eye brow, but when he said that I snapped back, "Well, I realize it's not big enough to hang your hat on yet, but I thought you might want to check it out." His nurse had to step out of the room because she was laughing so hard.

OK, so getting back to this visit, I had heard, black mole, almost always never benign, and Blue Nevus. That actually sounded like it should be some kind of tropical fish or exotic flower. But, I came home and looked it up on the Internet and read all about my special spot. I suppose I will be seeing the same doctor at the same office in six months. Unless, of course, they decide to move without telling me and then I will be looking them up on the Internet, try to make an appointment, hopefully not have so much confusion, (but maybe get another $20.00 Amazon gift card), so I can go back and have my Blue Nevus measured. Life is a series of strange events at my house. I really can't make up stuff like this.