I had to go to a clinic today to get a prescription refill (for an asthma inhaler). I’ve been putting it off because I hate going to the doctor because it is always a place that I feel worse off from when I leave. It started out okay - the nurse did a routine check on my oxygen level, pulse, blood pressure, and temperature, all normal, all healthy.

When I saw the doctor and she looked at the nurse’s notations – she said she didn’t think the blood pressure reading was right (which is insulting to not only me but to the nurse), she takes it again – same thing, 120/80. Now she goes through my file and asks me when my last blood test was – I told her it was only four months ago, and everything came back healthy. The only note on my file was that my iron level were borderline low – still in the healthy range, but at the minimum. This was unbelievable to her – it is not possible that I don’t have high blood sugar and cholesterol, she says I need to go for more blood work.

I told her that the regular clinic doctor I usually see told me that I only need a blood test every two years – ever year maximum, because my results are always the same, and it’s a big source of anxiety/paranoia for me. This doctor told me that I need a blood test every few months because of my obesity. So she fills out a blood test requisition despite everything, and then asks me if I exercise. I told her I do, and explained my current workout to her – she told me that I need to do more and that I need to go on a diet immediately because exercise won’t keep me healthy if I overeat like I do. The current workout that I do is over the minimum that is recommended for good health, so at this point I’m assuming that she thinks I’m lying, and I’m starting to panic because I have very bad anxiety.

She checks my breathing and tells me my pulse is very fast – and that it is probably because of my weight. I told her that my pulse is not usually very fast unless I’m panicking and right now I am very anxious. She asks me why I’m anxious – I tell her – because I have anxiety? I had already told her at the beginning of the appointment of my mental illness diagnoses and the psychiatric medication I’m on for my anxiety disorders, but apparently she couldn’t understand why I might be worked up.

Of course then the last thing I want is a physical exam because I know how she feels about me and my body and I want to disappear. She works extra hard to find this wrong with me, but finds nothing else to complain about. At this point, I’m just desperate to get out of there. I came for an inhaler for asthma that I’ve had since birth. The reason I need to use my inhaler is because of my obesity, she says. I tell her that my asthma is the best it has been in my life at the present time and I’m at my highest weight – I still need to use my inhalers regularly, but as a child until adolescence I was hospitalized yearly for treatments.

Finally, I’m leaving and she tells me that I need a family doctor, and to tell the people in charge of the waiting list that I’m morbidly obese and need a doctor because its an emergency. I just looked at her and left.

I think it’s worth mentioning that before this blog, I’ve always been humiliated and felt utterly defeated from situations like this – bullying at school, or at the doctor’s office, or at home and I felt like I deserved it. I thought I deserved to be interrogated and treated like I’m disgusting, my body is a disease, that I’m lazy, and negligent with my health, ugly, whatever – I thought that because I was fat, and that being fat was my fault – that I didn’t have any reason to stand up for myself, and now that I have a community to turn to online, even if it’s just this blog makes all the difference. I wish things like this didn’t happen, but you’re not alone, and it’s not right.