Doctors Don't take me Seriously

[Yeshuasdaughter]

I have several somewhat serious health conditions that have flared up recently.

I have been in and out of the ER, and referred to several different specialists.

I am extreme 13/10 pain, and also very dizzy and sick, and having low blood pressure and nearly fainting, and edema and more.

Blood work and imaging shows things are wrong with me. But when I go to a new doctor they roll their eyes at me and try to get me out of the office as quickly as possible, and I don't get the same follow up care or treatments as other patients.

Today, I googled it to see if other aspies have the same experience.

And the answer is yes.

Do you know why they don't take us seriously?

We have flat affect when we speak. Neurotypicals sound all pleady I guess when it's serious. I think I sound desperately pleady especially when I'm in pain and scared, but to a neurotypical doctor, I just sound like I am exaggerating.

And here's another weird thing. Neurotypicals will say something like "I have the worst headache of my life"..... and all they mean is that they have a headache.

I come into the doctor saying "I have the worst headache of my life" and if I say that I mean it. Like my headknobs are pulsating like wom-wom-wom with pain, and light and sound is excruciating to experience, and maybe I'm about to literally faint on their floor.

So they think we are using hyperbole, being hystrionic.

But I'm literally sitting there trying to explain symptoms in a calm, almost scientific way, Here is my list. And I say things like "I've never been in this much pain before", or "Next thing I know I'm waking up on the floor with towels and ice packs around me." or "It's so bad I am bent over and nearly pee myself in agony".

I really really mean that. Those are serious symptoms. But neurotypicals say that kind of stuff to exaggerate about regular symptoms I guess.

Dang it. I am very sick, and probably spending the American taxpayer tens of thousands of dollars a month in hospital and specialist visits, imaging, and drugs.

Can't a doctor just hear my symptoms, know I am not making it up, and treat me? So often I get an eyeroll and I am just sent out the door. I am usually nonverbal and in shock at this point and it takes a few days to come to my senses and make a follow up visit where I once again plead my case with a little more detail.

It's insane. I hate neurotypical games. I have zero quality of life sometimes and these so called "doctors" won't treat me the same as their other patients.

I've said it before. Doctors only "practice" medicine. They're idiots.

 

[NB79]

I don't go to the doctor much, but i have experienced this,
and even posted a thread about 'cassandra syndrome' the other time,
i also think sometimes that some other person 'breaks a nail' and everybody go 'oh look what happened' but i can be in some insane suffering, and even don't get believed or supported or reacted to.

I think it has to do with how they perceive our expressions.

 

[tree]

@Yeshuasdaughter

You are female.
This can definitely be a disadvantage
when you want to be taken seriously.

 

[Yeshuasdaughter]

You know what sucks? I am getting ready to go to the Emergency Room for symptoms that flared up that I was seen for at a doctor's visit at 1 o clock today.

The doctor at 1pm rolled his eyes and ushered me out of the room within minutes.

But I literally this morning got stuck in the bathroom, and just now I couldn't stand up from my recliner. I was trapped. Crying for help I could not get up for the life of me.

And I tell the doctor this and he thinks I'm making it up.

Well right now, I'm laying in my bed after an excruciating several moments, needing to catch my breath, and letting the throbbing go down, before I gather my things and head out to the hospital.

I was at the actual specialist that was hired to treat this exact thing. He had me as a captive audience and shooed me out with an eye roll.

It makes me so depressed.

 

[NB79]

You know what sucks? I am getting ready to go to the Emergency Room for symptoms that flared up that I was seen for at a doctor's visit at 1 o clock today.

The doctor at 1pm rolled his eyes and ushered me out of the room within minutes.

But I literally this morning got stuck in the bathroom, and just now I couldn't stand up from my recliner. I was trapped. Crying for help I could not get up for the life of me.

And I tell the doctor this and he thinks I'm making it up.

Well right now, I'm laying in my bed after an excruciating several moments, needing to catch my breath, and letting the throbbing go down, before I gather my things and head out to the hospital.

I was at the actual specialist that was hired to treat this exact thing. He had me as a captive audience and shooed me out with an eye roll.

It makes me so depressed.

Well, if it means something me too, i am like 15 years after i quit a medic prescribed 'medicine' and almost killed me, and i still have consequences, and nobody even my family believes me, there is plenty of testimonies and doctors that are aware of cases like this in other places, if it were not for Jesus that gave me strength i would be in the other side.

edit: I realize telling painful stories maybe doesn't help.

 

[Judge]

Ironically this is something I have run into with medical professionals on the level of Medicare.

As if all my aches and pains are "par for the course" because of my age alone. Where I can go on and on about my lower back pain and the most they'll say is to either grunt or nod, but little else.

But then they already know I'm not prepared to indulge in any pre$cribed opiates, so I guess they don't bother with me as I'm not a cash-cow compared to some of my peers.

As I posted in another thread, it's more about Adam Smith these days than Hippocrates.

Do no harm- not to a patient, but to the firm's bottom line. How can they take any patient seriously in this kind of environment ?

 

[WhitewaterWoman]

I am so sorry you are going through this. It is not right.

I have had that experience too, over 30 years of chronic pain. And I agree with tree, part of it is because I (we) are female and are considered (still) to be hysterical.

This is how I address it:

I pay nearly half my social security check in order to have a private doctor (takes no insurance) who believes me, knows me and provides continuity of care.

Before I retired, part of my work involved accompanying clients to their doctor appointments to ensure their complaints were taken seriously and addressed properly.

If you have anyone in your life who can accompany you and speak for you on these visits, it might help. In some areas, there a professional health care managers whom you can pay to do that.

It’s understood these things cost money. I don’t have much either.

Again, I am so sorry you are going through this. I will hold you in the Light.

 

[Wizardry]

@Yeshuasdaughter

You are female.
This can definitely be a disadvantage
when you want to be taken seriously.

Do even women doctors seem to have a tendency to take women less seriously?