There are a few things that Chad believes and I do not.  Most notably, Chad believes that a ceiling fan can create heat (which you can read about here, but just ignore that “anonymous” comment--I’m totally on to you, Chad). 

Most of our discussions about belief, though, involve me being open to or excited about or fervently attached to an idea and Chad explaining to me that I am, in fact, wrong.  Or gullible.  Or childlike.  Or flatly ridiculous.  This dynamic is part of what makes our marriage tick.

I’ve always thought that roadside vegetable stands are extremely charming.  I see a senior citizen in a lawn chair next to a box of tomatoes, and I’m sold.  Of course I’ll pay more! They’re farm fresh! Until...Chad told me that most of those folks purchase tomatoes from a Sam’s Club, set up shop on the side of the road, mark them up, and take advantage of suckers like me.

You would have thought Chad was exposing the Tooth Fairy as a fraud.  Those tomatoes now break my heart.

Or sometimes, I’m cooking, and I watch a sauce thicken or a bread rise and it feels like magic to me.  And I say, Chad, Look! Isn’t this totally amazing?  And he has to be all scientist and explain that this is what happens when heat reacts with blah blah blah.  I prefer to stick with the magic of the kitchen.

So, this is how we roll.  I stare in wonder and amazement, and Chad pats me on the head while bursting my bubble. 

And against that backdrop, you can imagine how well it went over when I called Chad to tell him that my chiropractor--a person practicing a form of medicine that he’s already WAY skeptical about--has recommended that I take an adrenal support supplement for 30 days.

Well, you don’t have to imagine because I’m going to tell you.

It’s a cold and gray Friday.  My mind is cluttered with a to-do list a mile long, and visions of unmade side items and unpurchased gifts are dancing in my head as I drive the 4.8 miles from the office to the chiropractor.  I hope my appointment will be quick today--I worry that I’ll be late for a lunch appointment and even later leaving for my family’s Christmas get-together.  Barely on time, I rush into the waiting area.  The chiropractor, who has taken to singing the Pina Colada song at the top of his lungs lately, yells that I can come on back.

In between crooning about being caught in the rain, he talks with patients and tells me he’ll be right with me.  He sings that he’s not into yoga, he calls me to his desk. 

And starts on the math.  Every Friday, I have to assign a number for the frequency and intensity of pain in every muscle in my body.  Not exaggerating.  Then he does some calculation based on my numbers and plots my progress on a graph and it is all just way too empirical for me, but, it’s my health, so I will cope with the scientific method. 

So, he’s staring at the numbers and notices that I’m doing really well on most of the pain metrics but not so much with the headache/energy/sleep ones.  And I suggest that it could perhaps be the Great Experiment with My Hormones striking again?  And he feels that’s possible, but he leans over the desk and says, “Can I ask you a personal question?”  And I’m thinking, isn’t asking personal questions the reason people become medical professionals? That, and maybe the cash?

So we have this conversation that I won’t repeat because it does, in fact, involve some pretty personal questions, but basically he decides that he needs to do some kind of experiment with my blood pressure.  And I’m like, here we go again with the numbers.  He shows me the numbers like they might mean something to me.  And announces that, eureka, he’s got it.  My adrenal system is shot.  Very common with fibro.  And I just need to take these supplements three times a day for thirty days.  And then all will be merry and bright. 

And he’s so excited about these supplements that I’m all excited, too.  And I get in the car, and I call Chad, and I scream into the bluetooth thing, Chad, I’m going to be healed!! I just have to take these supplements because it’s my adrenal system, and what a simple solution, and isn’t that just the best thing you’ve ever heard. 

And Chad says, Wow.  Not like, WOW! but like, wow, softly, and if I listen closely, I can hear him shaking his head on the other end of the line. 

Do I remember when we watched Penn & Teller’s Bullshit?  And they explained the deal with the supplements and particularly adrenal support supplements?  And they did this whole debunking process and decided these supplements were, well, bullshit?  Do I?

Yes, now I remember.  Okay. 

But, he means, if they work that’s great.  (And he says this because he’s listening closely and can now hear me making the tomatoes-aren’t-real face). 

So, yeah, okay.  Well, that’s all I wanted to tell him, and it’s really not a big deal and I’ll just chat with him later.  And I’m so sad about Penn and Teller and all that I forget to tell him that I’m moving through the treatment faster than expected and it’s probably going to save us a few hundred dollars.  And in hindsight, I hate that I forgot that part because he definitely wouldn’t have thought it was bullshit.

We’re coping with Chad’s skepticism in the only way that marriage works: compromise.  We’re referring to the supplements as my Snake Oil.  I have the good graces to laugh when we say this (and as I painfully chew those giant, foul-tasting bad boys up), and he has the good graces to remind me when it’s time to pop another one.