Funny thing about OBGYN appointments. They frequently ask for a urine sample right when you get there.
But of course, often I make a pit stop at before remembering I'll need it in a half an hour at my OBGYN appointment. All that golden urine, down the toilet.
One time I pulled into the doctor's parking lot before remembering--in a panic--they'd need a sample. I could tell I could not guarantee enough supply for the demand. My bladder felt sleepy and empty.
I guzzled a can of soda and headed in, saying a prayer for pee.
I am not above praying to God for conveniently timed fluid elimination.
I'm not above praying for just about anything. The worst He could say is "No."
Which He seemed to say this time.
After check-in and the initial record update and symptom questions, I was
presented with a small plastic cup.
"I don't think I can produce anything." I fretted.
"Just try." She said, with a smile determined to make the best of a bad situation.
Great, I thought. I'm going to be THAT patient holding up the whole schedule because nothing can happen before her urine is tested.
I have a bad track record with urine sampling.
My body gets performance anxiety and I'm squeezed tight as a drumstick at the bottom of a bucket of KFC.
Holding that Dixie cup in the general va-cinity is like shining a spotlight on my bladder.
I don't often get penis envy, but when I do, it's related to convenience peeing.
I wish I had a built-in spout, for those times when I'm in the woods, or a porta-potty, it's freezing outside and I don't want to uncover as much skin as it takes to do the job. Or when I'm riding on the interstate and I don't need an audience to see me unpacking the whole kit & kaboodle by the side of the road.
Not to get TOO disgusting, but...
When providing a sample, what lands in the specimen cup it sometimes called a "catch".
There's a reason it's called a "catch" for women. Without a convenient Man Hose, its anyone's guess which direction this girl's whizz is gonna fly. And the catcher's mitt it only two inches in diameter. Tension in the naughty bits also determines the velocity of the product, adding another wild card in the collection strategy.
"If I hold it at this angle what if it shoots the other way?
What if I bend forward, will that help?
If hold the cup too far away, and it's only trickle, will it escape out the back, following the buttock+gravity curve? (there's a mathematical formula yet to be named, I bet.)
And so on. All this scares the bladder into going on break.
Back on that day I sat, I waited, I rocked back and forth (a trick that worked when I was pregnant) but my plastic cup remained empty. Ten minutes passed, instead of my urine. I scooted toward the front of the seat, then the back, leaned different ways, cursed and then prayed again.
"God, please! I gotta fill this cup and quick!"
No Go.
One thing I've learned lately is if I'm tangled up over stuff, and I stop and thank God for whatever is possible to thank Him for at that moment, that act of saying thanks will ease my anxiety and I can relax.
So I thanked him for something, I can't remember what, maybe that I had health insurance, or that a curious toddler was not also in the bathroom with me, or even that there was free parking. (When I lived in Chicago, parking fees were so high that reserved parking places are often given as part of a woman's dowry, in place of the traditional dairy goat, or deep dish pizza joint.)
In this case, when I thanked him for a fraction of my many blessings, I was finally able to relax my pelvic floor, and my cup runneth over.
I was grateful all over that place.
