When Medical Care Finally Feels Like Care

I am incredibly grateful for the care team that I currently have.

One of the great things I have found at my current Medical Complex is that their staff and students are encouraged to be thorough and empathetic.

I have only had one less than stellar experience early on when we first moved here, but my entire team, from primary care to specialists, has been consistent in their understanding, taking their time with me, and making me feel like I am finally being heard by my doctors.

I know this really should be the norm, but my experience has been quite the opposite at most of my medical visits across several states throughout my life.

Over the years, I have spent a lot of time in medical offices trying to understand why I am sick, uncomfortable, or in pain. And far too often, the experience of seeking care has added another layer of stress and anxiety to an already difficult situation.

I have had people not take my concerns seriously when I have been in pain, which is wild because my pain scale is messed up anyway. I have been told nothing is wrong with me and it is all in my head. I have been told, “That’s just a women’s health norm,” when it definitely was not.

I am familiar with discrimination in healthcare. From being both under and overweight, to being a woman, to having assumptions made about my ethnic background, I have experienced what it feels like to walk into a medical appointment and wonder whether someone else’s assumptions will interfere with their ability to see what is actually happening to me.

And that is an exhausting place to be.

When you are already trying to navigate the possibility that something is wrong with your body; when you are trying to explain symptoms, understand what is happening, and figure out what comes next… And then you have to navigate the possibility that the person who is supposed to help you might not believe a single thing you have to say… It does something to you.

There is a particular kind of anxiety that comes with being vulnerable in front of someone who might not treat that vulnerability with care.

I think that is part of what has scarred me and contributed to my medical anxiety. It is not a fear of needles, procedures, or bad news; it is the fear of being dismissed, misunderstood, or treated like a stereotype instead of a person.

There is nothing more frustrating than feeling your worst and being treated your worst when you are just trying to understand your symptoms and feel better.

I also want to say that I understand folks who have gone into medical care and have a more science-driven brain than a people-driven brain. I can appreciate someone who is quiet, analytical, maybe even not naturally personable, provided they are taking my concerns seriously and approaching my care with respect.

I don’t need every healthcare worker to be especially warm, chatty, or emotionally expressive. I don’t need every appointment to feel like a personal connection.

What I do need, and what patients deserve, is for the person caring for me to recognize my humanity and remain committed to my wellbeing.

Sometimes that looks like asking another question. Sometimes it looks like taking a little more time to review a test result. Sometimes it looks like a doctor saying, “I don’t know yet, but let’s keep looking.”

And sometimes it looks like a receptionist, lab assistant, or nurse bringing a little humor and kindness into an otherwise overwhelming experience.

I think there is a difference between someone who isn’t naturally personable and someone who treats people with no regard for the person in front of them. I can work with the first. The second is what has made medical care so difficult for me.

While it feels like my bar for medical care was in the dirt, my current care team has certainly risen far above that bar. They have treated me with dignity and a commitment to help me get to the bottom of what is going on.

The empathy and compassion I am experiencing from my current care team have often left me wanting to cry because I finally feel like we are getting somewhere…

And getting somewhere has included a million needle pokes, surgeries, questions, and tests. It has meant appointments with specialists, waiting for results, and trying to make sense of things that I don’t yet understand.

It has also meant finally getting to experience medical care without having to spend so much energy defending the legitimacy of my own experience. That is something I don’t think I fully understood how much I needed until I started experiencing it.

For the past two years, good doctors, nurses, lab assistants, and receptionists have brought joy, humor, and grounding through what has been a complicated and often exhausting medical journey.

I am currently facing some medical uncertainty. There are things my doctors are investigating that we do not have answers for yet. I will be having a biopsy soon, and the terminology and procedure have me a little bit nervous. We are still searching for answers, and I do not know what to expect.

But I do know that I am grateful for the people helping me find them.

And I think it is important to say that gratitude doesn’t require me/you/us to be grateful for being sick.

I am not grateful for the pain, the anxiety, the uncertainty, or the things my body has been going through. I am not grateful that it took so long to feel heard. All of that can go straight to the trash!

However, I am grateful for the people who are caring for me now. I am grateful that they are taking my concerns seriously. I am grateful that I don’t feel like I have to convince them that something is wrong before we can begin figuring out what it is.

I can be grateful for the care I am receiving while still wishing that getting care had not been so difficult in the first place. I can be thankful for progress while still being scared about what comes next. And I can recognize the good in my current experience without pretending the bad experiences before it didn’t matter.

It is my wish that everyone who has to go through any kind of medical system or health scare has this kind of experience. That everyone has a team willing to listen, investigate, explain, and work together for their good. That people don’t have to fight so hard to be believed when they are already struggling. That being sick doesn’t also mean having to prove that you deserve care.

I am also encouraged by my latest encounters with med students and those in their residencies. It was a student that found my fallopian tube infection last year, and it is my current doctor in her residency that has stuck with me through trying to figure out all of this autoimmune stuff and all the random things that have popped up on this journey.

And I am grateful that, in the middle of so much uncertainty, I get to experience what it feels like to be treated with dignity, compassion, and care.

I am so glad and incredibly blessed that my team is full of people who care and are working together for my good.

I want to hear from you!

What have your medical experiences been like, from the great to the ugly? When was a time you felt dismissed by the medical system? And when was a time you felt heard and understood by your doctor?