TO SUE OR NOT TO SUE

 I keep asking myself (and repeating myself here): 

Would I sue the retina doctor who gave me such a dangerously inaccurate response to a very reasonable question: 

"Why do I have this retina condition?"   

My answer: No, I probably would not sue.  

I'm still enough of a lawyer to know that at my age, and at least still able to walk and take care of my basic needs, albeit in pain, and even though I have likely lost much enjoyable activity for the rest of my life, including events with family and friends,  and the travel I so looked forward to, what happened to me would not likely be worth much as I'd like in the eyes of a court or jury.  

Also I would likely run the risk that no other doctor in this town would ever want to touch me again.  

But mainly I'd probably forego legal action because no amount of money a court or jury might award could not remove the pain I live with each day or return to me my ability to enjoy travel or even informal get togethers with friends and family without pain.  

What would have been a correct answer to my very reasonable question as to why I had this eye condition?  I believe one good answer would have been "Because you have osteoporosis."  So I wonder: was a five syllable word just too much for this specialist's  highly schooled brain?  

Apparently so!  Because instead of this brief and correct answer, Dr. Timothy Flood carelessly tossed out the most dangerously incorrect answer imaginable:  "Because you are on Prolia!" And that was the end of that!    

Perhaps he really thought this was the connection -- although there would not be reliable information to support him. But I'll never know. 

But at the time, like a like a dumb-dope, I thought this fancy specialist knew what he was talking about!    I still do not know why I set aside my natural distrust of doctors at the time.  But I sure trusted the wrong one here!

It never occurred to me that he would give such a horribly wrong answer that would leave me in pain, perhaps for the rest of my life.      

It never occurred to me that I would wind up with poorly healed vertebrae and resulting pain to the extent that the travel and other activities I had looked forward to in retirement would be off the table.  

It never occurred to me that a specialist doctor with so much advanced training could so casually purvey such dangerous information.

Bottom line: No amount of money could repay what I have lost, including years of enjoyable activity as I approach the end of my life.  

I should probably give him an alias here.  Why?  Because a doctor so casually giving a patient a dangerously erroneous answer to a very legitimate question might be first in line to bring a defamation action against the patient they had so badly harmed with such a carelessly inaccurate answer to a question.  And of course there would be the embarrassment of revealing to the world that I was dumb enough to believe him in the first place!    

Back to the present: this is the season when in years past I would start planning a nice mid-winter getaway to someplace warm and sunny.  

Travel? Now?  I can't even drive a car!  Even walking a few blocks is painful, let alone handling luggage, dealing with airports or the rest of it.  

But for now let's just say that at least in my experience Dr. Timothy Flood was to the practice of medicine what Donald J. Trump was to the United States presidency: except the latter didn't leave me looking forward to a lifetime of disability and pain!

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