Now, I realize that I am a nightmare patient. I'm extremely well educated. I have a Google medical degree. I advocate vigorously for my own care. I do NOT take the doctor's word as if s/he is God. I insist on explanations for everything. I don't always follow directions perfectly (although I do when I trust the doctor is being specific to MY care, not just following some cookie cutter protocol).And I demand time, that most precious of medical treatments.
But even so, I think I'm cursed.
I didn't see Dr. Asshole yesterday, although he WAS at the practice and I saw him running around. Instead I saw Dr. Dismissive.
It wasn't a good morning to begin with. I slept badly (as I always do when I have to get up early for something), so I was tired. Charlie and I were bickering madly as we walked into the appointment. It was horribly hot in the waiting room, and so packed that not all the pregnant women got to sit down.
And then we waited. And waited. We waited for nearly an hour and a half. Which sucked, but would have been much less annoying if we hadn't seen several pharmaceutical reps get seen while no patients did (what the FUCK is with that, anyway?). Once we finally got back to a room, the doctor raced by, poked his head in and said, "I'll be right there!"
You know love at first sight? Yeah. I didn't have that for this guy.
He finally comes into the room, introduces himself, and then shakes Charlie's hand (he did not shake my hand). He plops down and starts flipping through my chart (why don't they do that before they come in the room?). I mention that I'm fabulously high risk, and this gets a smile, so I'm thinking we're going to be OK. But then he starts speaking, before he's finished reading my chart.
"You don't need to be on this much folic acid," he says.
"I have one variant of the Motherfucker mutation," I say, smiling. "You know, the MTHFR mutation?"
No reaction. I chuckle nervously, and say, "That's what we call the mutation in the infertility world."
Nothing.
"Still," He says. "You probably don't need this much."
I look right at him and say sweetly, "I trust Dr. Mama's assessment and recommendations, thank you."
He mutters, half to himself, "Well, it's not hurting you."
I say, "I'm also on a single baby aspirin a day to help prevent the preeclampsia."
He shakes his head. "That's voodoo." He says.
I reply, icily, "Not according to the Preeclampsia Foundation**, and several studies."
He waves his hand through the air, dismissing the Preeclampsia Foundation as a bunch of quacks.
I say, "And exactly how many research papers on Preeclampsia have you done, motherfucker?"
OK, I didn't, but MAN I should have.
When I'd suggested the baby aspirin to Dr. Mama, he said, gently, "We don't really know how effective that is. And while there are some risks in taking aspirin in pregnancy, at that dose it should be fine, so let's go ahead."
MUCH BETTER CHOICE OF WORDS.
Dr. Dismissive then suggested I do a series of tests (a 24-hour urine collection--fun!, an EKG, and a retinal scan) to get a baseline in case problems occur again. I don't think any of that will hurt, and may be helpful, so I have no problem going ahead with them, even though it's all a whopping pain in the ass.
Things were wrapping up. I asked him several questions, which he didn't bother to answer. At this point, I was waiting for the appointment to end, so I let it go.
The last thing he said was, "At this point we MIGHT be able to hear the heartbeat..."
At 14.5 weeks, he might be able to hear a heartbeat. Funny. At ten week, Dr. Mama thought he might be able to hear it. And gave it the ol' college try.
At that moment I knew I was not pulling down my pants for this man. "That's OK," I said. "We have a Doppler at home and have been hearing the heartbeat twice a day for TWO WEEKS."
Then he told us to go back to the lobby, but not to leave until we get my urine collection kit. After standing out there for twenty minutes, I finally asked his nurse about it.
He didn't tell her we needed it.
Fucker.
Many of you suggested that I tell Dr. Mama that I didn't want to see Dr. Asshole. I think it's critical that Dr. Asshole has to sit across from me and listen to what I have to say first. And an appointment is the best way to do that. If he is contrite, I might allow him to be part of my rotation. But I will be requesting that Dr. Dismissive be removed from my rotation. There is no way I would want that man present at a birth.
In the hallway of the practice, there is the requisite wall of baby photos. Over and over again, there are photos of a doctor holding a newborn baby with a huge happy grin on his face. The doctor in the photos is Dr. Mama. No other doctor is pictured.
I begin to see why.
It's not just me, right? It's completely unprofessional to contradict another doctor's recommendations, isn't it? Why on earth did he think that was OK?
Grrrrrrr.
Well, I'm off to collect my urine. Enjoy your day, everyone!
**According to several entries on the "Ask The Experts" forum at The Preeclampsia Foundation's website, aspirin therapy is still pretty controversial. It took data from over 30,000 women to show that taking baby aspirin had any effect at all, and then the improvement was small. But having lost two children to preeclampsia already, the 12% decrease in preeclmapsia and the 14% decrease in fetal mortality looks pretty damn good to me.
