The Sports Doctor
He
leaves dinner with his family,parents, sister, and brother. He
walked outside and goes a couple blocks before he goes into the next
high rise. He walks inside to set and talk to his shrink a colleague
from nursing school. He sits in his office and looks at a picture of
them on the wall in their nursing scrubs. It was hard to believe that
they worked through medical school like that.
On
his first job he worked for a wrestler. It was just entertainment. He
propped up Jones Jazz Malone like a mannequin. This was the easiest job
he had ever had in his life. They gave those guys steroids, that’s all
they wanted. He started dating, going to church, and met his wife. In
retrospect that was the best job he ever had. He
told her life would be hard, this was what he did. He would was in one
city now but this would not always be the case. He got mad and left the
job.
He talked about
the time he was a doctor for a football team the travel was extensive
and it destroyed his marriage. The injuries were also rough and the guys
like men with out brains. He and his wife never had any children. He
was never home. She was very particular about how a marriage and a home
should be. She got fed up and left.
He
got a call from an old player the NFL wanted him to consult on. He had
to sign all kinds of papers keep-it hush hush. The guy had no cognition
and was barely literate from a life in football. Busy Tate was living on
his NFL pension and after five failed marriages he barely had enough to
live. The NFL took care of his bills with admitting to wrong doing. He
was in the hospital one night, the NFL had me assigned as his doctor. I
called his kids and told them he would not make it through the night.
Not one showed up. He could not do many more of these cases and left.
Then
he talked about working with the NBA. It was good working with this
guys, even though they traveled, you could not tell it. It was more
intimate and nostalgic. The atmosphere was home like from city to city.
Maybe because they played all year. The injuries were not that bad. He
was fond of those guys and felt protective over them, they gave them
drugs to get them so they could play and to make them feel nothing or
numb. The guys that felt numb could half way function. The ones that
felt great became addicted. Their marriages ended, they spent all their
money on drugs, they lost all their money. They didn’t have an NFL
pension. The injuries were like small sprains but they
felt like their knees were being torn apart. This was like a placebo
effect.
This was when
he had his first affair with a cheerleader. It was a party atmosphere
every night. Everyone wanted to dull the pain that’s what he did too.
The guys that didn’t make it got hooked on the drugs, they left and it
destroyed their lives. That was when he left. He could always land
another job because everyone needed a doctor.
On
his next job he worked with a MMA fighter. The money wasn’t great. He
had a NFL pension so he could afford to take a cut. By this time he knew
he wasn’t going to have any kids, but he felt fatherly towards this
girl and protective of her. Diamond Reed was only 16 and she had managed
to snare an agent. She used fighting to help defend herself. When she
landed on the streets she came across some pimps. She enrolled in an
after school program and lived at local women’s shelter. She was
studying to get her GED. She got all the way up to the last rounds and
took a bad hit. I told her if she kept fighting she might never be able
to have a baby.
What happened
She cursed and told me it wasn’t true she wanted another opinion.
I walked out , she called a couple of weeks ago, and said she had a baby.
He
worked with a prize fighter. This was the most money he ever made. He
was a concierge doctor. How can you imagine you are a concierge doctor
to a guy you can barely stand. The money was great. Golden Jones paid
him 10 percent of his salary just to keep him ready to fight. He was at
his whim, he called him for everything from a cold to a bee sting. It
wasn’t long before the guy had the worse injuries he had ever seen. He
had to patch him up to go out to the next round. He was a mid level guy,
not good at all and this was real boxing. One day he sent him to the ER
from a broken neck and he didn’t make it. He just stopped breathing. I
walked out of his room and took off my coat after his family gave the
word. He was on life support before he died.
You thought this was what you wanted but you keep leaving.
I don’t know how to do anything else. He stood and grabbed his coat.
Where are you going now.
I am going to see my grandchild.
What’s next on to your next job?
You know I can because everyone needs a doctor.
