29. An Unlikely Tool
A totally normal-seeming gentleman in his 80s came in looking uncomfortable and not really wanting to sit down for us. He said he hadn’t gone to the bathroom in days and instead of going to a doctor to get a catheter, he decided that all he needed to do was, you know, unplug it. So he stuck a pencil so far up his urethra that he lost said pencil.
By the time we checked it out, we couldn’t even see or feel it. The look of panic and fear on the urology resident’s face as the ER doctor told him what was happening and showed him the X-ray was unforgettable. All this while the guy who had the pencil elbow deep inside him looked like he was waiting calmly for the bus. The most confusing aspect of all of it was that he went eraser first.