Physician's symptoms could be sign of illness
Dear Amy: My son-in-law is a physician at a large hospital.
He is exceptionally smart and well regarded, but he's also incredibly dumb at the same time. His errors, goofs and mistakes have gotten so bad, that we often think twice before inviting him and my daughter anywhere. He is a one-man debacle.
In only the last few months, he's started a kitchen fire in their house, fallen down the stairs (injuring himself), backed his car out through their closed garage door and flooded his backyard by forgetting to turn the sprinklers off.
Over Memorial Day weekend, they came to our lake house. In just three days, he lost his car keys, shattered an antique, burnt an entire meal on the grill and created unnecessary drama by miscommunicating our plans to several other family members.
My daughter seems to think his absent-mindedness is charming, but my wife and I do not. He does not drink excessively or have any medical issues. I've asked him to please be more careful, and it doesn't seem to stick.
We are planning a family vacation. My wife and I have considered not inviting them, because we want to keep our stress down, but this feels cruel. We love having our big family around us, but I won't have yet another vacation wrecked because of his foibles.
How do I address this?
-- Worried Dad
Dear Worried: You say your son-in-law does not drink excessively or have any medical issues, but how do you know? Have you conducted a neuro exam or tested him for drugs or other intoxicants?
One or even a few of these incidents could be chalked up to stress, exhaustion or absent-mindedness. The picture you paint, however, is alarming. I realize that you find this mainly annoying on your own behalf, but I hope you will speak, and act, out of concern for his health. Tell him (and your daughter) that you are worried because his coordination (and perhaps, cognition) seems to be getting worse. If he dismisses this, recount some recent incidents, and ask him what conclusion he might draw if a patient came to him with these issues. Urge him to get a thorough checkup.
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