Would it be different if I weren’t a woman?

August 21, 2019

I started a new medication. My doctor and I had discussed beforehand that the dose I wanted based on my research was higher than what he suggested. We agreed I would start at his level, then go up only if needed.

For the first two days I felt absolutely horrible. I increased the dose and felt less bad. I increased more and felt better. So I stayed at the higher dose for a bit. It still wasn’t having the effect I had hoped for, but I needed more time, and the higher dose meant my prescription would run out early. I messaged my doctor to get a new prescription.

My doctor said he didn’t remember discussing the higher dose and thought I should be on a lower one. We went back and forth several times in email. I was anxious: challenging doctors can be problematic. I don’t want to be considered a “difficult” patient. I want my doctor to like me so he’ll help me more. Many doctors dislike being questions. Many people dislike being questioned in general, of course, but doctors often have big egos, and are treated like they know it all.

As I talked to my therapist about my anxiety, I discovered two interesting things. First, she helped me connect my anxiety to the way some medical practitioners had treated me in the past. It all made sense when she connected the dots. In fact, it seemed obvious, but I hadn’t seen it.

Second, as I spoke, I said that this wouldn’t be a problem if I were a man. I didn’t even realize I was thinking that; it just popped out of my mouth. And the instant it did, I knew it was true. I had an imagine of the conversation I’d had with my doctor in his office when he prescribed this medication. I thought about how I presented my own research and his reaction to that. He wasn’t entirely dismissive, but he didn’t really consider it, either. And I felt that if I were a man, he would have actually listened to me and considered the merits of what I presented.

Am I right? Who knows. I can’t test this. But here’s what I do know: it is documented that women and men are treated differently by medical professionals. You can read about it here and here, among other places. Sometimes I wonder if this entire journey would be different if I were a man. I’m not saying men have it easy. They are often maligned for “giving in” to symptoms, and they are discouraged from expressing and dealing with the complicated emotions that come from living with chronic illness. Still, I wonder. Would I be taken more seriously? Would I get of the tests I request, less resistance to the treatments I want to try? Would a doctor still have refused to give me a medication in my late 20s because it would cause infertility, even though I told her I was willing to risk it?

Obviously, I have it easier in many ways, too. I am cisgender, petite, white, and well-spoken. That gets me farther in a lot of situations, including medical settings. I am bisexual, but most doctors don’t know that, just as most don’t know that I am Jewish. Still, this question about gender weighs on me.

I am curious, what experiences have you had in medical settings that you think may have been different if you presented as a different gender? I’d love to hear about them.

1 Comment | Educating, Expectations, Frustration, Healthcare, Medication, Rants | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

Acknowledging the pressure

July 23, 2019

“You’re feeling a lot of pressure.” When my therapist said those words, everything clicked into place. Yes! That’s what I was feeling and unable to acknowledge for myself, much less express to her, but she figured it out. And suddenly, it all made sense.

It’s hard enough to feel ill all of the time, but I also feel responsible for how I address my illnesses. I go to 5 different doctors and get 6 different opinions. I do my own research and figure out a course of action, but no doctor will order the tests I want or the prescription that I feel will help. I try to sort through all of the possibilities, the research, the unknowns, the assumptions, the inconclusive data. I talk to experts and I ask questions of other patients. I look at as many resources as I can. But at the end of the day, it’s up to me, and me alone, to decide what to do.

That’s a lot of pressure!

I want to feel better. I want to feel as well as possible. I don’t know what that is. Would that mean I was well enough to walk 3 miles? To finally get and care for the dog I’ve always wanted? To attend a wedding without having to leave early? To go out 3 nights in a row without becoming so ill that I can’t function for days afterwards? What is a reasonable goal? I don’t know. No one knows. But still, I aim to feel better, whatever that might be.

And as I aim to feel better, I must make myriad decisions. It’s scary and overwhelming. I have a bit one coming up in a day and a half and yes, I am overwhelmed and scared. I have a lot of research to do between now and then. I worry that my doctor might not agree with the approach I want to take or vice versa. I could be wrong. I won’t know until I try this new medication. This is my health, my one and only body, my life. If I get this wrong, there are no do-overs. The result would be damage that is likely irreversible. On the other hand, doing nothing will also result in irreversible damage, which means I have to do something. And I am the only person who can ultimately decide what that something will be.

So yeah, that’s a shit-ton of pressure. And I hate it. At least now I recognize it for what it is. I am learning to sit with my feelings. Still, the pressure is intense and it’s real. This is my life that I’m deciding about. I hope I make choices that improve it.

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Insurance that won’t cover medication

May 10, 2019

I have always been financially independent, meaning I supported myself. I worked in nonprofit for my entire career, so I never earned a lot of money. Still, I lived frugally and made it work, while managing to save money. Then I became too sick to work. Suddenly, money became a big problem.

Social security, fuel assistance, and food stamps helped, but they weren’t enough. I was pulling money out of savings every month. Thankfully I had savings, and enough that I wasn’t on the verge of ruin, but not enough to last me indefinitely. I tried to work multiple times. Each time I increased my hours, I got sicker. Some weeks I could manage 5 hours of work. Some weeks 10 hours. But if I tried to work 10 hours per week for two weeks in a row, it was a disaster. Even 5 hours per week wasn’t sustainable over time.

Then last year, I got Section 8! (For those outside the U.S., Section 8 is a housing subsidy. These days, the wait list to get Section 8 can be 10 years or more, and the restrictions for using it are very strict. With this type of Section 8, you pay no more than 1/3 of your income on rent, and the government covers the rest.) I was in shock. I thought I would be on the waiting list for several more years, but out of the blue, I reached the top of the list. Finally, I could cover all of my basic expenses with my benefits! I would still have to take money out of savings if I wanted to go to the theater, eat dinner with friends, buy clothes, or pay for car repairs, but this was still a huge improvement. It lasted about a minute.

Less than two months later, I got kicked off of food stamps. They said I earned $20 per month over the limit. I had no idea where that number came from, because I wasn’t close to the limit. So I did the paperwork and sent it in. I got food stamps back, but the same month I started a new prescription. It has to be compounded, as probably all of my medications will have to be from now on. That’s the only way to get this particular medication without any corn or gluten in it, which is a medical necessity for me.

Unfortunately, Medicare doesn’t care that it’s a medical necessity; they refuse to cover compounds. At $150 per month, this is obviously not in my budget. I appeal and was denied. I found an amazing patient advocacy group that helped me with a second appeal at no cost. My patient advocate helped me in many ways and this time my appeal included a 1000 word letter about why I need this medication and how it helps me, a more thorough letter from my doctor, and more of my own medical records.

And I was denied. Again. I can continue to appeal but it won’t help. Compound medications by their very nature are not FDA approved, and Medicare won’t cover anything that isn’t FDA approved. So I’m stuck.

Again, the good news is that I can afford this. I have savings. The bad news is that savings only goes so far. And every time I need to add a new prescription (I will probably have another in the next month or so) it will most likely need to be compounded. The costs might vary, but it won’t be cheap.

I take a lot of supplements and visit a lot of medical professionals. I spend about $600 on healthcare despite having great insurance. I take only ONE prescription medication and yet my insurance won’t cover it, so now I need to increase my medical spending by 25% to cover this additional $150 per month.

For a few weeks I could cover my expenses without dipping into savings or having to ask my parents for money. It was glorious. If only Medicare worked the way it should, I would still be in that position. Instead, I am watching my savings slowly go down month after month and it’s terrifying. But I need this medication to live.

Now please excuse me, I need to go call in a refill of my medication.

2 Comments | Expectations, Frustration, Healthcare, Medication, Rants | Permalink
Posted by chronicrants

Normalizing the horrid ways I’ve been treated

April 13, 2019

For seven months my therapist has spoken with a woman who fights hard for her health, who does her own research, fights with insurance companies, argues for the tests she needs, pushes her way in to seeing the best doctors. So it’s no surprise that when I expressed my fear that I might one day just give up the fight, my therapist asked a question to which she thought she knew the answer: “But is there really any chance that you will give up?”

She definitely looked surprised when I said yes, but it was the look on her face when I told her why that surprised me.

Here in Massachusetts, there’s a large doctor network (Harvard Vanguard now, previously called Harvard Community Health Plan for you local folks) where the doctors refer patients within the network, read each other’s notes about patients, see each other’s patient test results, etc. These days this isn’t so unusual, but back in the 80s and 90s it was. Going to these doctors seemed like a good thing, because they communicated with each other. I spent my entire childhood and my early adulthood there.

When my therapist asked if I might really give up I said yes, because it’s so exhausting to keep fighting. And who knows if getting better is even an option? Sometimes I really want to just give up, to say that this as good as it’s going to get and I’ll maintain what I have, but there’s no point in trying for more. And then I do it anyway. Even though it’s exhausting and all-consuming and overwhelming. But maybe one day I won’t. After all, I gave up once before.

I’m not talking about taking short breaks, while knowing I will resume the fight again in a few weeks or a few months. I’m talking about actually giving up, choosing to stop trying altogether. After all, it’s what the doctor told me to do.

I had been undiagnosed for around 7 or 8 years. I had seen many doctors and even had exploratory surgery which yielded no answers but did manage to permanently increase the pain. Sadly, one downside of that doctor network is that I only saw the doctors that I was referred to, and I was referred to the ones who could properly diagnose me, like a rheumatologist. That would have been very helpful. Instead I saw surgeons, orthopedists, and other specialists who didn’t have any answers. Of course, I was also sent to a psychologist, but that didn’t help the pain for now-obvious reasons.

I will never forget the day, almost 20 years ago now, when I saw yet another doctor for yet another opinion, endured yet another painful examination, and was told to stop coming in. She didn’t mean I should stop coming to her office, but to the entire network of doctors. She made that very clear. And since the other doctors hadn’t been able to help, had been condescending when I suggested that perhaps my different symptoms were related (it was years later that I found out they were in fact related, and earlier treatment could have helped a lot,) and generally hadn’t tried to help me if there was no immediately obvious problem they could name, I gave up. I was done.

For a couple of years I stopped seeing doctors for anything more than annual checkups and acute situations. I didn’t even consider attempting to get better. I would simply be in horrible pain every minute of every day for the rest of my life.

Obviously that didn’t last forever and one day, practically out of the blue, I decided to take advantage of my ability to see a doctor without a referral for the first time in my life. I found a rheumatologist and was diagnosed within a week of that visit with an autoimmune condition. It was my first correct diagnosis. But before that, I had given up.

You would think my point in telling you this would be to show the value of self-advocacy, doing our own research, etc. That’s not my point today. That has been my point in many other posts and it will be in many more to come, but today my focus is on how I have normalized that horrible incident with the uncompassionate doctor. When I casually mentioned that the doctor had said I should stop coming in, I saw the look of horror on my therapist’s face. She’s not naive. She has worked in the medical system for many years. She knows this kind of things happens, but she hasn’t normalized it like I have.

That’s not to say I think it’s ok. And if someone dared say that to me again, I would react very differently now, that’s for sure. I certainly wouldn’t stand for anyone saying that to someone I care about. But back then, I was scared and shy and tired of trying, so I accepted it. And over the years I have seen and experienced so many forms of terrible treatment by medical professions and by the systems that are meant to support our health that I am no longer stunned. I am sickened and angry, but no surprised.

I don’t like that I have become so jaded, but I guess that is what 27 years of chronic illness does, at least in the U.S. medical and benefits systems. And what I find even sadder is, I know I’m not the only one.

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