The Good Doctor

It's hard to imagine a good doctor anymore. Since all the doctors who I've visited over the past few years have subsequently drugged me, it's caused me to think back to my old family doctor, Dr. Feldman.

When we first moved to Tinley Park, Illinois from south New Jersey in 1971, my family acted like we just landed on Mars. We had to find a church and we had to find a doctor. Actually, a doctor was more important than the church. We looked around for doctors and found that most of them were not only not Italian, which had been a requirement in the past and not hard to find in south Jersey, but didn't speak English at all.

It was all farm land where we moved in 1971 and the few doctors who ventured out south of Chicago were mostly non-English speaking doctors. We wanted one who we could understand. We landed on Dr. Feldman. Dr. Feldman had a German accent, but you could understand him pretty well.

Through the years, I had to visit Dr. Feldman regularly. I had allergies when I was a kid and was always getting shots. Dr. Feldman gave me the shots every week. He was the doctor who took the plantar's wart out of my foot (dug it out with no anesthetic) and gave me a note to get out of swimming in gym. As I got older and prepared to get married, he also tested me and my ex-husband for Syphilis, as was required back then.

Throughout the years, Dr. Feldman went above and beyond when it came to care for my family. My mother always brought him a tray of home made cookies and candy for Christmas and he and his wife appreciated it very much.

I noticed that Dr. Feldman had a deep gash on his one wrist. It used to frighten me as a kid. I also noticed the tattoo on his hand. I never understood what they meant until later in life.

Dr. Feldman was the first person I went to when I had anxiety, a short lived thing that has only lasted for the past 15 years. His advice was not to drug me at all. He suggested that I start walking. What a concept - the idea of walking and exercise to relieve stress instead of drugs. He also suggested having fun with my kids, as they were little back then. Of course, I wasn't smart enough to take that advice. I wanted an instant cure.