I don’t think anyone enjoys going to the doctor for any reason. It’s not a fun experience; no one is going to make a doctor visit video game or amusement park ride. The closest thing we get to that is those doctor’s office porn movies where someone visits the doctor and the doctor is like “Looks like you need 200CCs of blowjob, stat.” But even then you’re just watching someone get a blowjob on that crinkly white paper in a hospital gown, no one wants to see that, I’m just going to fast forward to the next scene where the doctor can’t afford to pay her taxi fare.
So when you’re going to do this shitty thing you don’t want to do, the last thing you need is for the doctor to be an ass. This is what happened to Sarah Silverman when she went for a mammogram, and she shared her experience on Instagram.
I had a shitty time at my mammogram appt today.
I have to get an ultrasound after my mammograms because I have dense breasts (insert joke here) and this radiologist — the same man I had last year — I do not like him and here is why:He opened my gown and put gel on my breasts and smeared it around with his bare hands. Then he started talking to me about my chest X-ray (I also got a chest X-Ray) and was pontificating with my boobs just out and covered in gel and cold and finally I said “Hey-can we either talk about this when I’m dressed or WHILE your doing the ultrasound? I’m not comfortable with my breasts out just shooting the s**t with you”
Okay so — he smears the gel on with his hands and NO GLOVES on and when he glides the ultrasound wand thing over my breasts he drags his fingers on them and it fucking bothers me. Again, AS I TOLD HIM LAST YEAR, I said “Hey! Do you need to be touching me with your fingers?” He said “No”. And he pulled them off of me. Then he added “I do that for balance.” I said “Well I believe in you and I think you can do with without your fingers on me”
Look, I truly don’t think he was getting off on it, BUT it is his job to be aware that this is vulnerable for a woman. Wear fucking GLOVES – this isn’t a date. For him to be so arrogant that he didn’t even internalize the problem when I said something to him about it last year is obnoxious and probably a subconscious power thing if we’re getting deep.
That was my last mammogram with this dude. Or any dude.
Look. I’m a grown woman and I’m fine. But this guy does this with everyone and I know that personally it took many years into adulthood before I spoke up for myself. It’s uncomfortable and too easy to think it’s all in your head. And arrogant fucks like this doctor take advantage of women’s socialized instinct to not speak up.
All this to say speak up. Trust that thing in your gut that tells you this s**t ain’t right.
Okay, I’m a dude, I have very little frame of reference for this having never had a mammogram and not having breasts, so I asked my partner about it. Apparently you go in and get yours tits squeezed between a couple of sheets of plastic with an amount of force roughly equivalent to getting felt up by the Incredible Hulk. Also, there’s the possibility that at the end of it someone is going to tell you that you have to have your breasts removed. Or worse. So this is more uncomfortable than your average doctor’s office visit already.
This is already a stressful and even scary experience under the best of circumstances. These are medical professionals and no one is saying this is some sort of sexual thing, but at best it’s just plain not helping. Bedside manner is a part of being a doctor, and this is poor bedside manner. When a doctor doesn’t consider the patient’s feelings like this, it can be disconcerting and just adds to the stress and makes an already unpleasant experience even worse. And that’s not what a good doctor does.