Is your Doctorate in Douchebaggery?

My youngest son has been complaining of stomach pain on and off for a little bit. He has a tender tummy and picks up stomach bugs easily. I figured he had a virus. Almost everyday for the past two weeks he has pleaded with me to stay home from school. Now I am starting to think there is something going on at school. I sat him down and asked him if there was anything going on and gave him the “You can tell us anything and we’ll love you no matter what” speech. He insisted that nothing was wrong.

Wednesday, I decided if he was going to ask to stay home that we were going to the doctor to make sure everything was okay. I called our regular doctor and they could not get him in until late afternoon. That wouldn’t work because I need to be home for my other children afterschool. So I decide that I would give Methodist Medpointe a try. That is where I was horribly wrong.

The office staff and the nurse were extremely friendly. Then the doctor came in. She was obviously dismayed by the fact that East Bluff riff raff had slipped through the invisible fence that keeps us all South of War Memorial Drive. She sizes me up and asks me why my child isn’t in school in the most condescending tone I have ever heard. Well, maybe it is the fact that he is having stomach pain or that when your nurse took his temperature he had a fever! Then she starts in about his weight. According to her he should weigh 75 pounds because of his height. All my boys are skinny and tall. That is how they are built. They all eat quite well, I can assure you. So she pushes on his stomach and refers him to a pediatric GI specialist.

I have never been treated like I was a complete piece of trash the way I was by this doctor. Even my son said, “Mom, she was a snot to you.” By the time she was done with me I was ready to call DCFS on myself! I’m sure she thinks that my son isn’t in school because he is running a pickpocketing ring to finance my gambling/strip club that I run out of my basement! He’s skinny because of all the cocaine he does and because he has to fight all our pitbulls for food!

I will never set foot in Methodist Medpointe again. I will pay the extra money (double my already high copay) to go to Proctor First Care. I am also going to complain to Methodist. We don’t pay ridiculous health insurance premiums and copays for this. Just imagine if I was on medicaid?! I don’t care how long you went to school or who the hell you think you are, you don’t treat people like that.

UPDATE: I have spoke with someone on Methodist’s pride line. She couldn’t believe how poorly I was treated. She had an adminstrator call me for more details and now I am expecting a call from the guy who oversees all the Medpointes. I was told that he will perform an investigation and interview the staff of the Medpointe and the doctor from hell. He’ll get back to me when that is completed.

Customer Service

I was reading the Sunday Journal Star and came across this article about customer service. I must admit that Larry the pretzel guy’s response made me chuckle because anyone who has worked any job where you provide customer service has had days when they felt like Larry the pretzel guy. Every job I have every had I have always tried to go above and beyond, all in the name of good customer service. I do have to confess that I have had a “Larry the pretzel guy moment”.

When I was in college I worked at a video store that was across the street from a bar. I dealt with drunks on a regular basis. All the regular customers liked me and I never had a complaint. I even had a customer contact the home office to tell them what a good employee I was. One night I was working when a woman, who had been in earlier, came back with a bag of microwave popcorn that was completely burnt to shit. She told me she purchased the popcorn and it tastes terrible so she wants her money back. We had a no cash refund policy but we would provide store credit. She said no she wanted cash. I explained the policy again and that I could not give her cash. Then she told me the popcorn was expired so I had to give her her money back. I explained again that I could not give her cash only a store credit. She proceeded to show me a product code (not an expiration date) that was on the INSIDE flap of the box. I told her that that was a product code and not an expiration date and told her that I would gladly give her store credit but not cash. She starts screaming about the popcorn being expired and me not giving her cash. Then I had my “moment”. I asked the woman if she had ever eaten cottage cheese. She looked confused so I continued to say that you don’t eat an entire carton of cottage cheese, get to the bottom and find out that it expired three months prior because expiration dates are on the outside of packages not the inside flap. The popcorn wasn’t expired, you burnt it and I am sorry for that but I can not give you cash back only store credit. She snapped. She wanted the manager, who wasn’t there, and she wanted her cash. She told me she would be back to talk to the manager about me and get her money. I kindly wrote down the manager’s phone number and his schedule so she wouldn’t miss him. She never called and never came in to talk to him. Sometimes you just can’t hold it in anymore and she was damn lucky that was all I said to her!