“I’ll Just Mark You as Difficult" — Every Woman Knows This Appointment #MedicalGaslighting

Speaker: No, I'm not running that test for you. I don't think you need it. You feel sick every time you stand up? It's probably just 'cause you're on your period. Yeah, listen, I know that you have all the symptoms to qualify for that, but I don't like that you said it to me.

It makes me feel like you're challenging my authority, so I'm gonna go ahead and mark in your notes that you're difficult to work with. So the thing about pain is it's actually stored more in the brain than it is in the body, so if you can just re-carve that mental connection, your body pain will probably go away.

Yes, I'm gonna go ahead and refer you over to psych. I don't recognize your symptoms, so I'm gonna go ahead and put attention-seeking in your permanent file. You have chest pains that are getting worse by the hour? It's probably just anxiety. No, we're not gonna give you any pain medicine during the painful

procedure because women are kind of more like cattle than people. I mean, you should just feel a pinch. Your head hurts so bad that it feels like somebody's slamming the back of it with a sledgehammer? How much red meat would you say you eat on a daily basis? Hmm, chest pain that you're worried might be a heart attack, and

you have a family history of it? Well, I'm gonna go ahead and make you take a pregnancy test first because if you have a baby, I'm definitely gonna prioritize that baby over you, and I'll just let you die. Bayo: Is this still happening? Unfortunately, it is, and here's what you can do. I'm Dr. Bayo, your health advocate.

If you have ever felt like you were being dismissed by your doctor, here are three phrases that could help change that conversation. Start off with saying, "I understand you feel you know what's causing this, but what tests can we do to rule in and rule out other possibilities?" Because that one sentence can help keep the conversation