When my grandfather was a child ( maybe 8 or so ) he had appendicitis. This was a VERY long time ago and the doctor encouraged his mother to allow them to operate. They did and my grandfather was in the first 10, or so, who had that operation. Needless to say, he lived and thrived and I thank GOD that his mother was wise enough to have him operated on.
The doctored told her, he would die without the operation and while he "might die", during the operation, there was a good chance the he wouldn't.
I hope that you now always listen to your wife. :-)
It is against my nature but since I was told that I owe my life to her, I do try to listen to her more. Before my surgery I asked the surgeon if they could just give me some antibiotics and let me come back to get things sewn up after the infection cleared up.
This seemed like a reasonable suggestion to me. When the doctor told me I was going to die if I didn't have surgery right then, I assumed he was just trying to win the argument. But what kind of rebuttal can you come up with for that one? So it is slightly possible that my problem does go a little beyond normal stubbornness.
That is a very interesting story about your grandfather. Most people do not realize how much medical care has progressed in just the last hundred years.