Walking Through Walls (20 page)

Having watched this drama for a couple of days, I was finally waking up to its seriousness. “Is she going to die?” Not the question I should have asked in front of Christina, who began weeping. The last few days were taking their toll on her.

“Christina, Christina, she's not going to die. She will get through this; it will take awhile. I can't repair what they've done. They've taken out too much of her colon. I can do whatever is possible to help her heal quicker so that she doesn't have any more infections. I think we need to go down to the hospital and find out what's going on.”

Back we went to the hospital. My father asked for Mrs. Cortez. The nurse didn't respond but first checked her records. “I see that Mrs. Cortez is still in ICU.”

“Okay, thank you.” My father took Christina's hand and headed toward the swinging silver doors of the ICU.

“Excuse me! Excuse me! Sir, sir, sir, stop! You can't go in there. Stop!”
The nurse got up from her station and started running after my father.
“Stop. No visitors. You can't go in there.”

My father turned around and said, “We're going to see Mrs. Cortez. I need to see how she's doing.”

“No, no, you can't. No visitors. I'm sorry.”

“But we need to see Mrs. Cortez. This is her daughter. She wants to see her mother.”

“No. Not now. You'll have to wait until she's moved to her room.”

“When?” My father really wanted to get in that room and see what was going on.

“I don't know. Why don't you call us this afternoon, and we'll let you know.”

“Can't you just let her daughter in for a few minutes to see her mother?”

“No. Not right now.”

“Can we call Dr. Siegel? I'd like to speak with him.”

“I'm sorry, but Dr. Siegel isn't here today; he's off on Fridays.”

“So who is looking after his patients?”

“One of his associates.”

“May I speak to him?”

“Let's see. I think Dr. Falk is covering for him today. I need to go back to my desk and try and page him.”

Christina and my father followed the nurse. She paged the doctor. My father reached over and held Christina's hand. Within a few minutes, a chipper Dr. Falk appeared. He was the opposite of the imperious Dr. Siegel. Warm, friendly, open. He approached my father with a smile and an open hand. “Hello. I'm Dr. Falk. How can I help you?”

My father introduced himself and Christina. “I'm inquiring about Mrs. Cortez. This is her daughter. We're very concerned about her. This is now her third operation, and I'm wondering where it's going to end. It seems things are getting worse.”

“No, not at all, she's doing quite well.” Dr. Falk punctuated his statement with a big smile.

“Doing well?” my father asked.

“Uh-oh,” I thought, “here it comes.”

“Dr. Falk, Mrs. Cortez was fine when she walked in here. She had a simple impaction that could have easily been remedied. Instead she had dangerous and unnecessary surgery. As a result, she became infected, and now she has peritonitis. She's lost much of her colon, all because she was misdiagnosed.”

“Misdiagnosed? I'm sorry, I don't understand. I'm not that familiar with this case, but I doubt that she was misdiagnosed. Mrs. Cortez had cancer that needed to be removed. I'm not sure if we're talking about the same patient.”

“Did they actually find any cancer during the procedure?”

“I wasn't there, but I'm sure they did. Otherwise, why would they have operated?”

“I can tell you they didn't find any cancer, because there never was any cancer to begin with.”

“Mr. Smith, I can understand that this is very upsetting, but let me assure you that everything—”

“How would you feel if they took out most of your colon for no reason?”

“Well, I doubt that they would have—”

“Look, it's too late to fix this. When can we see Mrs. Cortez?”

I was relieved that he didn't start going into the whole psychic-pendulum-diagnostic-doctors-don't-know-anything routine. Let's just find out where Mrs. Cortez is and go home, was my attitude.

“Well, uh, I, uh, let me check. I believe she is recovering in the ICU, and it may not be until tomorrow that she will be able to return to her room, but let me make sure. I'll be right with you.”

Dr. Falk went behind the nurses' desk and started looking through charts. He appeared to be slightly flustered by my father. Looking up, he said, “Yes, here it is. Mrs. Cortez should be back in her room tomorrow. She's heavily sedated, as this last surgery took over three hours, and—”

“Three hours? What were you doing to her for three hours?”

“Well, um, she had some complications, and we were able to correct them, and now she's fine.” Dr. Falk worked hard at forcing a smile.

“Dr. Falk, is there any way we can get in to see Mrs. Cortez for just a few minutes? We won't disturb her. I think I may be able to help her, if I could just get in there for a moment or two.”

“Help her? In what way? Are you a physician?”

“No, but I think I can speed her recovery and eliminate the recurrent infections that she is experiencing due to the unnecessary surgery.”

“Oh. Well, I think that she's doing quite well.”

“Doctor, if she has one more surgery, she won't survive. You will have killed her.”

“Well, but Mr. Smith, we are not killing her, and she is doing fine, and she will be in her room tomorrow, and if you'll excuse me, I have some patients I need to see. I'm sorry, but I think tomorrow would be better for you to visit.”

Once the doctor left, my father turned to the nurse and asked if we could get into the ICU for just five minutes.

“I'm sorry, no one is allowed into the ICU—visiting hours are over.” She went back to reviewing her charts.

My father looked at Christina and said, “Let's go. I'll do what I can for your mother from the office.”

As soon as they got back to the office, my father sat down at his desk and pulled out his diagnostic charts. For the next half hour, he used his pendulum, his paper clip, and a variety of medical texts to further diagnose and send healing energy to Mrs. Cortez. While my father worked, Christina went into the back and put up a pot of strong black espresso. Its thick, roasted aroma filled the office. Growing up around
los exiliados,
I started drinking Cuban coffee at a very young age, while all the other kids were still sucking on their bottles of Yoohoo. As I sipped my
cafécito,
I picked up the phone and started gossiping with friends.

About a half hour later, my father stood up from his desk and said out loud, “Okay.” He went to the bathroom, washed his hands to remove whatever negative vibration had accumulated, and headed to the back workroom looking for Christina, who was calmly applying nail polish with intense concentration. My father said to her, “Christina, listen, I've lifted your mother's fever. That's why they didn't want to let us in to see her; the infection was taking over her body. These doctors have made a total mess of this. I wish I could have stopped them from operating. I couldn't. I think I need to have a lawyer on retainer just to threaten all the doctors who won't listen to me. But the good news is that her fever is gone. I brought her temperature back down and removed the infection. You will be able to see your mother tomorrow. Don't get upset when you see her; she won't look good, she's been through a lot. I'll keep working on her so that we can get her home in two or three days. She is going to have a colostomy bag. With what they did to her, she might never have a normal bowel movement. She will constantly autotoxify and will always be sick for the rest of her life. However, after she's home for a few weeks, and the body has had time to rest, I may be able to fix her colon, and within six months she'll be functioning normally. Please be patient with me, and I'll do everything I can for her.”

Christina had had enough excitement for the day. She remained focused on her nails, admiring them and applying more polish as my father spoke. Without looking up, she said, “Thank you. Thank you, Mister Smith.”

The next day, Mrs. Cortez was back in her room, although she was in and out of consciousness. My father and Christina drove over and spent several hours at the hospital. Mrs. Cortez had indeed been running a dangerously high fever, which was now gone. She needed to rest.

Just as my father predicted, Mrs. Cortez was released and sent home two days later. Her recovery was slow. For the longest time, it appeared that she would never regain her health—a fact that Christina was quickly accepting. But after two months, Mrs. Cortez was up, moving around, and able to sit outside to take the fresh air for about an hour a day. She gradually began to eat normal food instead of baby food, and her spirits grew stronger. Daily, my father monitored her progress and sent her healing energy. About four months after the operations, Mrs. Cortez was back eating
moros, sofrito, vaca frita,
and other staples of Cuban cuisine. In short, she was her old self again.

It was around this time that a man and woman walked into my father's office late one afternoon looking for beaded draperies for their bedroom. They discussed the particular look they were after, and my father began making suggestions. Suddenly my father turned to the man and asked, “What do you do? Are you a doctor?”

The man said, “Yes, a radiologist.”

My father loved having doctors as clients because he could pick their brains and learn firsthand about medicine. “Doctor, if you don't mind, I have a question. Can you tell if someone has cancer from an X-ray?”

“No, not really. What you can see is a shadow on the X-ray, and that might indicate cancer, but no, you cannot see cancer on an X-ray.”

“So, if someone had an X-ray that showed a shadow in their colon area, a doctor might think that they had colon cancer?”

“Probably yes. But that does not mean that they have cancer.”

“Do you have a card? I like to keep the business cards of my clients.”

“Sure.” The doctor took out his business card and handed it to my father.

After studying the card, my father said, “Oh, I see you work at St. Francis.”

“That's right, I'm the staff radiologist there.”

“By any chance, would you be familiar with Mrs. Sonia Cortez? She was recently operated on in your hospital.”

“Oh, yes, I know the case well. I reviewed the X-rays.”

“So, you looked at the X-rays and determined that she had cancer?”

“Well, like I said, she had a shadow, and it was determined that she was at risk, and the best option was to perform a procedure.”

“But couldn't that shadow have also been an impacted colon?”

“Yes, it could have been, and if I remember—it was a while ago—I think that was in fact what she had.”

“So the surgery was unnecessary, and if she had been given an enema or a laxative, she would not have needed surgery?”

The doctor began to shift in his seat. He had clearly said too much already. “No, surgery was absolutely necessary because we wouldn't have known otherwise. We needed to take precautions.”

“Precautions?”

“Yes, if the surgery had not been done, then the cancer could have spread.”

“But she didn't have cancer.”

“That's correct.”

“Then how could it have spread?”

“Mr. Smith, I was not the surgeon on the case. I only read the X-ray.”

“But it was based on your recommendations that the surgery was performed.”

“Why are you so interested in this case? What has this got to do with you?” The doctor was becoming aggressive.

“Let's just say I'm an interested bystander. I knew that Mrs. Cortez didn't have cancer, and I tried to stop them from operating when they didn't have to. As a result, she ended up having three operations that almost killed her and nearly destroyed her life.”

“Well, I don't think they had any choice. If they had simply ignored the shadow, and it was cancer, she would have died. Even though there were difficulties, she's alive. The doctors did a good job.”

“But they didn't have to operate.”

The doctor shrugged his shoulders. “How did you know that Mrs. Cortez didn't have cancer? Sounds like you are guessing after the fact.”

“Speak with Dr. Siegel. I'm sure he'll remember me as the man who tried to stop him from operating, but he went ahead anyway after I told him not to.”

“But how did you know?”

“I'm psychic. Not all of the time, but much of the time.”

“What do you mean, psychic? I don't understand what you're trying to say.”

“I can look into people's bodies, give them a diagnosis, and heal their illness without surgery or medication.”