Probably an entry just for girls.
I was self-conscious today as I waited for the doctor on the table, all wrapped in my gown with the sheet over me. I was worried about my feet -- they didn't smell very nice. With my combination of shoes and socks today, something just went awry in the two hours that elapsed between putting them on and taking them off in the examination room. I've only now forgiven myself for my smelly feet: if the doctor hadn't been an hour and a half late into the office this morning, I wouldn't have had that extra hour of time to sweat in my socks. Obviously I was sweating because I was nervous -- this was my first visit to the lady doctor in too long. I felt guilty about it being so long, and I was anxious about the pap smear. Last time I had one, it HURT! Also: cold speculum, fingers, new doctor, etc. Anxiety. Sweat. Smelly feet. Extended for over an hour: the doctor's fault.
Some reports:
I am now officially 8 pounds more than the weight I have been forever. In all fairness, I think this has been the case for at least three years, but I just haven't been around a scale.
I officially used the bathroom in uncomfortable proximity to a jar of someone else's pee.
I officially felt confused in the examination room, unsure of whether I was done and could go home, or if someone was going to come in and do something else to me. Why do I feel so powerless at the doctor's office?* I definitely left thinking I had missed a step; not gotten a test I thought I was getting. But did I feel empowered to ask to see the doctor? No. She was already running behind, and the reception ladies were busy yapping on the phone. So I left, confused. And feeling a bit manhandled.
* A man I work with recently had open heart surgery -- a quadruple bypass. He was telling me about the experience yesterday.. about going to the doctor for the tightness in his chest and eventually ending up in the hospital later in the day waiting for an operation. He described how quickly he understood that he had to be his own advocate -- no one else was really looking out for him in those quick moments of crisis after he was told he had to go to the hospital. He had to argue with the ambulance that had come to pick him up over where he was to be sent (the doctor told him to go to Hospital A, the ambulance wanted to take him to Hospital B.) Where was his doctor? Who knows. It chilled me to hear that -- I put so much reflexive trust in doctors.
Some reports:
I am now officially 8 pounds more than the weight I have been forever. In all fairness, I think this has been the case for at least three years, but I just haven't been around a scale.
I officially used the bathroom in uncomfortable proximity to a jar of someone else's pee.
I officially felt confused in the examination room, unsure of whether I was done and could go home, or if someone was going to come in and do something else to me. Why do I feel so powerless at the doctor's office?* I definitely left thinking I had missed a step; not gotten a test I thought I was getting. But did I feel empowered to ask to see the doctor? No. She was already running behind, and the reception ladies were busy yapping on the phone. So I left, confused. And feeling a bit manhandled.
* A man I work with recently had open heart surgery -- a quadruple bypass. He was telling me about the experience yesterday.. about going to the doctor for the tightness in his chest and eventually ending up in the hospital later in the day waiting for an operation. He described how quickly he understood that he had to be his own advocate -- no one else was really looking out for him in those quick moments of crisis after he was told he had to go to the hospital. He had to argue with the ambulance that had come to pick him up over where he was to be sent (the doctor told him to go to Hospital A, the ambulance wanted to take him to Hospital B.) Where was his doctor? Who knows. It chilled me to hear that -- I put so much reflexive trust in doctors.
posted by beth at 4:35 PM
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