Spin-off: (Ladies only) How long has it been since your last gyn check-up/physical?

[justme]

Wow, I'm kind of surprised that many other feel like me about avoiding it. I feel exactly like Doran about Western medicine. It is is impersonal, inconvenient, expensive and uninspired(meaning very rigid, not open to change and very stuck in their ways and on their egos). I also find it very demeaning. Ever notice how everything about a visit puts you in a very subordinate/vulnerable position? The long wait in the reception room designed to let you know how much busier and important the doctor is, being shuttled into a stark, cold room where you have to wait even more in a flimsy paper gown just to feel more powerless and exposed. The psychology of it is actually very powerful. then you are poked, prodded, interrogated and often lectured if they find something not to their liking. It makes me feel like an animal.

 

Anyway, as to the question of even I'm 'scared' of cancer? The answer is no. I have zero risk factors, no woman in my family has ever been diagnosed with any kind of cancer (most live to 100 or more), and I take care of myself. I guess I feel that I have good genes on my side and a history of good health. It just doesn't enter my mind. I feel so much of those 'Health statistics' are just propaganda designed to scare and badger us into consuming more health care/tests/diagnostics.

[Colleen]

In fact, now that my youngest is 4 I said to my husband "I really miss Dr. Reinardy". My first man ob, but it's like they become your friend. Just me? Weird?

 

 

I absolutely *loved* the OB who delivered my second and third sons. I prefer male OBs, btw. He was in private practice and I loved everything about going there ~ the office, the receptionist, the nurse, the chats with the OB himself (wonderful Christian man), and...well, this sounds silly...the attention. Just getting that time to myself and feeling "pampered" in a sense, kwim? That doctor closed his practice just after my third son was born so I switched to another man whom I also liked very much. He was in group practice and I didn't really care for the office, but I got along very well with that doctor. When I saw him at a store about year after my fourth son was born I felt inanely happy to see him: "Hey! How are you! It's been too long!" ~ I think I fairly made a fool of myself.:tongue_smilie: Then with my fifth son I had to switch doctors yet again, this time to a woman. She had absolutely NO bedside manner and I developed no relationship with her whatsoever. She was, however, an excellent surgeon and clinician, and when an emergency situation arose toward the end of my pregnancy, she was the right woman for the job. But personable she was not.

 

Any-hoo...all of that to say, I do understand about feeling like the OB is your friend ~ and missing that friend when all is said and done.

[Colleen]

Glad someone else said this so I didn't feel all alone with this sentiment...I do the dentist and OB regularly...I had a physical about 2 years ago, and I thought it was sorta useless. I know there are folks who are helped by this stuff, but, really, I think I'm more self-aware and able to take myself to the doctor when something is a bit amiss.

 

I don't go to anyone regularly, but I do see the advantage of regular gyn visits ~ even though I don't do them. I mentioned below, though, that I would never schedule a physical. I don't see the value in that for the very reasons you and Doran mentioned.

[Colleen]

I'm just curious about those of you who never or rarely go, how you aren't a little bit scared? Cervical cancer is so curable if found early enough through pap smears. Am I just a paranoid individual??:lol: I guess I can be a worry wart.

 

Oh, I don't think you're paranoid or a worry wart; you see the value in regularly pap smears and early detection. That makes good sense. Sooner or later I may get around to doing regular gyn visits, but I've not been compelled thus far. Maybe I would be if were scared, but I'm not. I don't know why I'd be any more (or less) scared of cervical cancer than any of the other potentially scary things in life, kwim?