Spoonies: Why You Should Go to the Doctor Looking Like Sh*t
I 've lived with chronic illness my whole life. In the past, I 've been seen as an attention-seeking hypochondriac by doctors, teachers, co-workers, family, and friends. Now, that I have proper diagnoses, I no longer have to deal with these trauma-inducing reactions, but for others, the struggle is still on.
At the beginning of the year, I wrote a question on Quora that I thought might garner a dozen or so responses. In the past few months, the question “What 's the most unprofessional thing a medical doctor said to you?” has blown up with more than 100 responses, and I get new ones almost every day.
While I haven 't been able to read them all, I 've skimmed the large majority. …show more content…
What I mean is, most individuals on the female side of the gender spectrum automatically 'fix up ' before going out in public. Even if they 're sick and going to the doctor.
It never dawned on me when I was in my twenties that my appearance had anything to do with the way people treated me. Even when I was exhausted, nauseous, and had horrible stomach pain, I still forced myself to put on makeup, do my hair, and look “good” before I went to a doctor 's appointment.
It was a routine that I followed automatically without any thought to how this would affect the way a medical professional would treat me. I felt horrible, but since I looked fine, I wasn 't taken seriously.
In one of the answers to the question I posted on Quora, a woman said she 'd finally gave up trying to look good and went to the doctor without fixing up or hiding anything. He took one look at her and ordered a bunch of tests right away.
The Medical Advantage of Looking Like a Zombie
It wasn 't until very recently that I 've been able to leave the house without makeup on a regular
I 've lived with chronic illness my whole life. In the past, I 've been seen as an attention-seeking hypochondriac by doctors, teachers, co-workers, family, and friends. Now, that I have proper diagnoses, I no longer have to deal with these trauma-inducing reactions, but for others, the struggle is still on.
At the beginning of the year, I wrote a question on Quora that I thought might garner a dozen or so responses. In the past few months, the question “What 's the most unprofessional thing a medical doctor said to you?” has blown up with more than 100 responses, and I get new ones almost every day.
While I haven 't been able to read them all, I 've skimmed the large majority. …show more content…
What I mean is, most individuals on the female side of the gender spectrum automatically 'fix up ' before going out in public. Even if they 're sick and going to the doctor.
It never dawned on me when I was in my twenties that my appearance had anything to do with the way people treated me. Even when I was exhausted, nauseous, and had horrible stomach pain, I still forced myself to put on makeup, do my hair, and look “good” before I went to a doctor 's appointment.
It was a routine that I followed automatically without any thought to how this would affect the way a medical professional would treat me. I felt horrible, but since I looked fine, I wasn 't taken seriously.
In one of the answers to the question I posted on Quora, a woman said she 'd finally gave up trying to look good and went to the doctor without fixing up or hiding anything. He took one look at her and ordered a bunch of tests right away.
The Medical Advantage of Looking Like a Zombie
It wasn 't until very recently that I 've been able to leave the house without makeup on a regular