Post #110: All by myselfffff......

But Brad! I thought you.....CARED for my colon!

I think I maybe just broke up with my doctor. 

A few things I know for sure: 

1.) During this appointment, I bypassed the ugly cry and proceeded straight to the bawling, hiccuping, snotty sob-attractive!
2.) I don't feel like having to fight to be heard or understood anymore
3.) I felt stupid and foolish for DARING to have a different opinion
4.) I need a second opinion

I came into the appointment prepared, as always, with a nice little information sheet and list of questions. Things started off as usual, but at a certain point I found myself tuning out the doctor's responses as an angry chorus repeated in my mind: LISTEN TO ME! LISTEN TO ME! WHY ARE YOU NOT LISTENING TO ME?

I told myself I wouldn't be combative, that I would be able to have a polite, dispassionate, constructive discussion of my disease and current symptoms. But guess what? I have no polite, dispassionate, or constructive feelings towards my health at the moment. I wanted to be noticed, and heard, and most importantly, believed. I left feeling pitied, discounted and embarrassed for having been so emotional. 

I wish I could have held my own during that appointment. I wish I could have had a rational conversation with my doctor without the hysterics, because crying in front of medical professionals makes me feel weak. But I wasn't able to, and halfway through the appointment I just gave up. I kind of dumbly nodded my head and said I understood, because I wanted it to be over. I didn't want to fight and argue and push back against anything. 

I don't think I have a bad doctor; in fact, I think I have a really good doctor.....clinically. But as I managed to spit out during the appointment, "I am more than my test results." The sum total of my experience cannot be accurately captured in a relatively clean colonoscopy or unremarkable lab results. I wish he could understand this. 

Finally, he asked if I wanted a second opinion, and I said I thought it was time. 

I could go into more of the specifics of the appointment; how he did, indeed try to blame my symptoms on my IBS instead of my IBD; how he recommended a dietary approach like he invented the fucking diet I'm on; how he invalidated my opinions because they were things I just "knew" and couldn't prove, or because "time of onset doesn't equal causation;" how he said he was sorry, and I believed him. 

It doesn't really matter. I cried all through the appointment, and then all the way home, and then in bed a little under the covers. I felt alone and disappointed and emotional and angry. 

I don't have the energy for this. I don't have the energy to advocate for myself with an entirely new doctor at a different hospital. I don't have the energy to start all over again, and repeat tests and conversations and spit out a list of symptom after symptom. I could stay with this doctor; things didn't end badly enough that there is irreparable damage, but it was certainly a turning point. I could pretend nothing happened and continue on, but we would both know things were different. 

I don't have the energy to push forward, but I also don't have a choice.