2 years in, and it‘s time for a tune-up. All my physicals, skin checks, dental x-Rays, eye exams, and unmentionable exams are expired, so my fall calendar reads like a med student rotation schedule. Happily, these visits are not without their entertainments:

• There are no hospital gowns for your physical – you just take your stuff off and hang out, literally everything just hangs out. The reason for this makes good sense – it‘s so the doctor can evaluate full systems instead of isolating one spot at a time – but it is a little disconcerting to sit there completely ‚a la‘ the first time it happens.

• If you tell your GP that yes, of course you do monthly self-breast-exams, they can identify you as a liar as well as your doctor back home, even with the language barrier. But instead of telling you to do them at home, the GP has you take off all your clothes up top, and does an exam on the spot. OK, I learned my lesson – I need to be a better liar.

• Emergency rooms are really just places you go where they make sure you‘re not actually dying, then they send you to your doctor. You have to park a half mile away, ring a doorbell to get in, tell the person over the speaker why they should let you in, and if they deem the reason isn’t good enough, they send you to a doctor to get a referral first. They have glue stitches and an AED and that‘s about it, and most employees are sitting outside smoking.

• The language barrier is still an issue, even if the doctor speaks perfect English and you speak a little German. Like when they tell you that you have hyPERthyroidism, but you actually have hyPOthyroidism. Which you discover only by reading the results of your bloodwork in German, and then going online to the Cleveland Clinic to see what’s what. Happily, I was given the correct medicine, which is really all that matters.

• Doctors here sometimes ask you a question that seems self-evident. Like today, when the lady doctor told me that the instrument they usually use is ‘quite large’, but if I’d like, she could use the smaller, thinner version. When I replied with some Bavarian slang along the lines of, ‘yes please’, she almost fell over laughing, which I took as a real accomplishment.

Speaking of cracking up, I have to tell you about the forms I had to fill out at the lady doctor today. They were, by far, the longest list of medical questions ever, and it was taking forever, so I started rushing through a bit. Who reads this stuff, anyway? So when it came to the question asking about what type of birth control I use, I couldn’t remember the word for ‘Matt got fixed’. So I put down, ‘Mein Mann is kastriert’, which roughly translates to, ‘my husband is castrated’. Along with a smiley face. I knew when the nurses read that part because of the howls of laughter behind the front office.

They also asked how many pregnancies, births, etc, and whether the births were normal. So of course I put yes – normal enough, right? But they asked me to clarify that I had not had a ‘Kaiserschnitt’ – whoops! I guess C-sections aren’t entirely normal. But it was so long ago, seems normal enough at this point!

And finally, there was the usual confusion over our street name, which I have covered in a previous post. Yes, I know – ‘To the ring walls!’ doesn’t exactly sound like a street name – even to the people who live here. It is easy to see why they might ask me twice whether I’m sure that’s where I live. In a tone that implies that in addition to being an American, I might have bigger problems, too.

But honestly, I have been so lucky with all of the doctors here so far – they are so much kinder than they have to be, and so patient with all of my questions and bad German and anxieties about ‘baring it all’ for an extended period of time. It is super weird doing this stuff in a different place from home – but at least it adds an element of interest to what would otherwise be a pretty dreadful series of appointments!