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I've been seeing my male OBGYN for over 20 years now and I joked about how he got to see the girls grow old the last time I saw him as he was doing the physical exam.
We both laughed until he slid that thing in where the sun doesn't shine. Better him then some stranger.
He knows me inside and out.
Male or female? He's still a professional and I'm just one of the many patients he's seen over the decades.
31 years ago, I was a pregnant 17 yr old kid who had left her parents house, had no health insurance & was getting prenatal care at the county clinic.
I could have been the "poster child" for a DHHS "Don't end up like this!" campaign.
I was laying flat on my back, feet in stirrups when in walks the doctor WITH 6 MALE MED STUDENTS & proceeds to flip on the overhead lamp & give a 10 minute dissertation, complete with full visuals, on the proper way to conduct a pelvic exam!
I guess I was just a piece of convenient meat to them, or at least that's how it felt. There was a poster on the ceiling (there is ALWAYS a poster on the ceiling...) of a kitten hanging off a branch or something & it said "Hang In There!"
I tried to keep from kicking them in the teeth by telling myself "Maybe this will seem funny to me in 20 years & I'll be able to look back at this & laugh?"
But, no; instead, the older I get the more angry it makes me when I remember it; which I don't all that much. It's not like it haunts me or anything.
That being said; theres not much that could happen in a doctors office that will top that for me now, male or female!
Your trauma has taken over your accurate memory. It's ludicrous.
NOBODY in a million years is just laying there in stirrups waiting for a doctor in a closed room. LOL the receptionist said "OK get undressed and lay on table, put the stirrups up and get in them?"
They don't even PUT you into the stirrups until you're laying on the table and getting instructions of WHEN and how far down to lay.
And NO doctor just waltzes in a room and does that without speaking to you, for goodness sakes.
And no doctor just waltzed in a room and does a pelvic without even asking you how you are and if you have any concerns etc so THEY KNOW WHAT TO GIVE EXTRA ATTENTION TO.
And yes, in teaching hospitals, or maybe county clinics, that's where you might have students observing but I've NEVER EVER had someone NOT ASK me first. But ok, YMMV on that.
And I had my kid a couple years before you. And, BTW, pelvic exams were not routine in pregnancy back then. I know because my OB had a giant fight with my Company doctor refusing to do them.
One of my classmates in high school wanted to become a gynecologist so he could get paid to look at women's privates all day. I told him that half of the women are obese and many will have hygiene issues. He changed his mind.
Your trauma has taken over your accurate memory. It's ludicrous.
NOBODY in a million years is just laying there in stirrups waiting for a doctor in a closed room. LOL the receptionist said "OK get undressed and lay on table, put the stirrups up and get in them?"
They don't even PUT you into the stirrups until you're laying on the table and getting instructions of WHEN and how far down to lay.
And NO doctor just waltzes in a room and does that without speaking to you, for goodness sakes.
And no doctor just waltzed in a room and does a pelvic without even asking you how you are and if you have any concerns etc so THEY KNOW WHAT TO GIVE EXTRA ATTENTION TO.
And yes, in teaching hospitals, or maybe county clinics, that's where you might have students observing but I've NEVER EVER had someone NOT ASK me first. But ok, YMMV on that.
And I had my kid a couple years before you. And, BTW, pelvic exams were not routine in pregnancy back then. I know because my OB had a giant fight with my Company doctor refusing to do them.
Actually, I had a pelvic exam at the county health clinic (needed medicaid and you had to have a doctor examine you before you could get medicaid but you had to have insurance before any doctor except the county clinic would see you for pregnancy) and the nurse had me get onto the table, put my feet into the stirrups and just lay there waiting until the doctor (female) came in and did a very painful pelvic exam, when I was 15 weeks pregnant. The doctor might have said one sentence to me, I can't remember. There were no questions about how I was or any concerns etc.
I had my baby at a teaching hospital and by the third day of trying to induce, they were bringing groups of students in to feel how high my cervix was and see if anyone was able to rupture the membranes to get labor started. I didn't put up with it for very long...if you're not dialated at all, it's a very uncomfortable thing to go through once, much less over and over. I ended up with a c-section and about 30 people were in the room...six doing the actual delivery, an anesthesiologist and six of his students around my head, a team waiting to take the baby to NICU, a bunch of nurses. The operating room was two stories high and there was a glassed-in observation room that had more people observing.
I've gotten less tolerant of things like that over the years. When I got an IUD, my GYN was being trained on how to use a different kind of applicator for it and she asked if I was okay with having the doctor who was training her in the room, and a couple of extra nurses. That was okay with me. She's done a bunch of biopsies on me and the IUD was a pretty similar procedure, and I trust her. Another time there was a brand new student doctor shadowing her and he was asking me what my visit was for, and he couldn't pronounce or spell "endometrial", and I had a feeling I might be the first person he was doing a pelvic exam on (or the first vag he ever saw), and I told my GYN I'd rather not have him there and she was fine with it.
I would always prefer to see a female gynecologist, not because I worry about anything sexual with a male doctor, but because I assume she will have greater insight/understanding of issues related to the female reproductive system.
If I were a man I would likely prefer to see a male urologist for the same reason.
Actually, I had a pelvic exam at the county health clinic (needed medicaid and you had to have a doctor examine you before you could get medicaid but you had to have insurance before any doctor except the county clinic would see you for pregnancy) and the nurse had me get onto the table, put my feet into the stirrups and just lay there waiting until the doctor (female) came in and did a very painful pelvic exam, when I was 15 weeks pregnant. The doctor might have said one sentence to me, I can't remember. There were no questions about how I was or any concerns etc.
I had my baby at a teaching hospital and by the third day of trying to induce, they were bringing groups of students in to feel how high my cervix was and see if anyone was able to rupture the membranes to get labor started. I didn't put up with it for very long...if you're not dialated at all, it's a very uncomfortable thing to go through once, much less over and over. I ended up with a c-section and about 30 people were in the room...six doing the actual delivery, an anesthesiologist and six of his students around my head, a team waiting to take the baby to NICU, a bunch of nurses. The operating room was two stories high and there was a glassed-in observation room that had more people observing.
I've gotten less tolerant of things like that over the years. When I got an IUD, my GYN was being trained on how to use a different kind of applicator for it and she asked if I was okay with having the doctor who was training her in the room, and a couple of extra nurses. That was okay with me. She's done a bunch of biopsies on me and the IUD was a pretty similar procedure, and I trust her. Another time there was a brand new student doctor shadowing her and he was asking me what my visit was for, and he couldn't pronounce or spell "endometrial", and I had a feeling I might be the first person he was doing a pelvic exam on (or the first vag he ever saw), and I told my GYN I'd rather not have him there and she was fine with it.
2001 for the pelvic exam at the county clinic, 2002 for the birth.
I opted for a different hospital for my second child's birth. That was more normal, an operating room with two surgeons, one anesthesiologist and a couple of nurses, and my husband was allowed to be there the whole time.
I've had surgery at the hospital where I had my first baby, twice in the years since then. (I've got good health insurance, I just feel like I get better care at that hospital and some of the doctors are really great, besides they're cheaper which matters when I'm having to pay a percentage of the total charges.) It's never been in a huge operating room with a crowd watching, just a regular room, a surgeon and an an anesthesiologist and some nurses. Although those were under general anesthesia, so for all I know, they might have every medical student in the city troop through while you're out cold.
2001 for the pelvic exam at the county clinic, 2002 for the birth.
I opted for a different hospital for my second child's birth. That was more normal, an operating room with two surgeons, one anesthesiologist and a couple of nurses, and my husband was allowed to be there the whole time.
I've had surgery at the hospital where I had my first baby, twice in the years since then. (I've got good health insurance, I just feel like I get better care at that hospital and some of the doctors are really great, besides they're cheaper which matters when I'm having to pay a percentage of the total charges.) It's never been in a huge operating room with a crowd watching, just a regular room, a surgeon and an an anesthesiologist and some nurses. Although those were under general anesthesia, so for all I know, they might have every medical student in the city troop through while you're out cold.
Out of curiosity, do you view yourself as some kind of Princess? It's not as if everything deserves to go your way just because you are pregnant or a woman.
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