Friday, March 3. 2006It's official: "lesbian" is a form of birth control! A few years ago I had to get an x-ray done. Of course, the usual questions about pregnancy came up:Nurse, "Do you know if you are pregnant?" Me, "I am certain I am not." Nurse, "Are you 100% certain? We can test you for pregnancy if there is any doubt." Me, "I am 100% certain." Nurse, "Are you in a committed relationship?" Me, "Yes, I am." Nurse, "What method of birth control are you using?" Me, "None" Nurse, "How can you be certain, then, that you are not pregnant?" Me, "Because the other person in this relationship is a woman." I was quite offended, not really sure why, but soon realized that this was not the last of similar questioning in my life... Last year, I went to my ob/gyn for my yearly check-up and again, the question of birth control came up. We had a similar conversation to the one above, where I, again, felt that I was reminding the doctor that yes, women date women!
As the session came to an end and I was getting ready to leave the room, I glanced at my chart which she had left on the chair. Under the category Birth Control, the Dr. had written "Lesbian." Do any of our readers have similar stories to share? Trackbacks
Trackback specific URI for this entry
No Trackbacks
Comments
Display comments as
(Linear | Threaded)
God I love this story. It reminds me of the questions asked if you want to donate blood or bone marrow. If you're a man they ask you if you've had sex with a prostitute since 1976, and if you've had sex with another man since 1976. So if you're gay or like paying for your sex, you're blood is automatically diseased. Right.
I have a friend who in college made it all the way through the screening process for donating bone marrow at a "bone marrow day" on campus. No one asked him about his sex life. A few weeks later he got a call saying he was a match for a kid out in California. Would he be willing to get flown out there and help save a life? Hell yeah. So they went through the motions. The next day he received a follow up call where they asked him a bunch of questions, including: have you ever had sex with a man? Being gay, he said yes. They vowed to destroy his marrow and accused him of wasting their time. Never mind that he was HIV negative. I hope they found a donor for that kid.
When I had my mandatory off-to-college medical checkup, I went through pretty much the same rigamarole. You should've seen the look I got when I said I didn't use any form of birth control. People think kids are so dumb, it's just insulting sometimes. I showed her who was dumb, though. I've never liked doctors, and being queer just adds to my dislike of the way they behave toward patients.
It's absolutely teeth-grinding. If they need to ask such questions, it should be, "Have you had unprotected anal sex" (and then unprotected sex in general) in the past __ years." And that's IT. It's not just bigoted, it's fucking stupid. If you have sex with men, and if like all you ever do is say mutual masturbation and maybe protected oral, you are so much safer than an innocent wifey who constantly has unprotected intercourse with her husband; after all, we don't know what HE'S been up to on the down low, now do we? And chances are neither does she, but in goes the blood anyway.
I would totally confront that nurse next time, if you feel up to it. "May I see my chart? Why do you feel the need to label me here? It makes me feel stigmatized. Next time, I would appreciate it if you just ask me the questions and accept my answers at face value. Thank you."
I just out it right at the beginning: "I'm sexually active. With a woman." It goes over like gangbusters in Kentucky (actually, my planned parenthood RN was very nice and didn't bat an eyelash when I told her at my last annual).
I had someone give me a pregnancy test because I presented with all the signs of an ectopic pregnancy. And I was twenty at the time, so maybe they just don't believe girls who say they're not fucking men. But when I told her I really wasn't pregnant--I may have said something about spit vs. sperm--she said, "Oh. That's different." (This was Minnesota in 1996. So it was actually cuter in a Minnesotan accent.) And then insisted that I take a pregnancy test. I don't actually blame the lady, and who can you talk turkey with if not your OB/GYN? But I wish they tried to make it a little easier on you. And don't even get me fucking started about blood donation. I think it's actually criminal that they keep men-who-sleep-with-men's blood away from people who need blood transfusions. Oh, that's right, don't put the NON HUMAN blood in an innocent person's body. But these days it just makes my day to expose another ob/gyn to the fact that he or she has a big queer for a patient.
#4
on
2006-03-08 09:19
This stuff drives me crazy, but, I have to say, my straight white male doctor is awesome: he always uses the language "unprotected anal or vaginal sex with a man" rather than "sex" and he says he does that with all his patients, of all genders. Nor does he feel the need to note my sexual orientation on my file. My sexual behavior seems enough. So, I love him.
It is amazing to me though the assumptions that other people have. Even in NYC, it's amazing what people assume. |
SupportersLinks We LikeBen Yee Public Advocate NYC
Rey Pamatmat Playwright Bart's Trabaca Chroma Queer Literary Journal Desperate Kingdoms Doug Ireland Immigration Equality The Lesbian and Gay Foundation UK Little Yellow Different My Porch Blog Pam's House Blend play rey play Queer Podcasting Directory Queer Day The Republic of T YVY Mag Ad Links The Maneuver - film about the man behind Heimlich Maneuver Web Usability Consultants Holiday Promotional Products & Business Gifts SponsorsSyndicate This BlogBlog AdministrationBlog Directories  |
About Big Queer |
