I’ve had a bout of worry that I’m not getting enough.

In what you might call a very general way, this has been in my head off and on for as long as I can remember, but it’s been a constant this past month.

That’s since the drink I had with my mate Dave, who’s really, really worried he’s not getting enough.

Conversely, Jimmy (the guy he works with) – who Dave reckons is the big “swinging dick” in their office – claims that if he has to cope with getting any more than he’s already getting he’ll have a heart attack.

Apparently when they were discussing this (that’s Dave and Jimmy) Jimmy began to laugh, presumably about coping with all that he was getting. Dave said that he began to laugh as well, at least for the first ten seconds, but this then came to a halt when he realized 1) he didn’t know what was so funny and 2) he suddenly realized that unlike Jimmy, he wasn’t getting enough. At least, he didn’t think he was.

When I asked Dave why, when, where and how he’d suddenly reached the conclusion he wasn’t getting enough, he suddenly clammed up like he didn’t want to talk about it.

I was a bit pissed off at his reaction; after all, he was the one who first brought up the subject when he told me about having a drink with a Jimmy. What had prompted their discussion about whether each of them was getting enough he didn’t explain, nor why Jimmy had started to laugh.

According to Dave, Jimmy was laughing almost uncontrollably for two or three minutes. I hadn’t realized how much this whole subject had been lurking in my mind until last week when I stopped for a drink with Phil, one of my work colleagues. As we walked into the bar we use occasionally, I was aware of a couple of guys laughing their heads off. Quick as a flash, I wondered if they laughing because they were getting more than they could handle.

However, having raised the issue two days ago with my cousin Lionel

(who’s a doctor), I’ve come to the conclusion that whether you’re getting too little or too much isn’t a medical condition, but a male curse rooted less in your erotic itching than in your state of mind.

When I told Lionel about my current worries, all seven years at medical school could offer was “join the club.”