When I entered into the Neurologist’s office with the support by hospital staff, the first question he asked was, “How did it happen? Like showing up at day clinic on a stretcher?”
I will blog about it separately.
The Neurologist wasn’t the same doctor I saw at the initial consultation. The hospital staff who took me to the Out Patient Department and made sure that I would land on patient chair in the doctor’s office safe and sound, told me that a registerer Neurologist was scheduled to see me. The way she told me, I assumed that the “registerer” holds much better qualification than just a Neurologist.
He was a young and well dressed doctor. The one word to explain about him is “elite”. I like intelligent people. But I don’t think I can say the same for elite people. Elite people can be an art of human beings who has achieved the highest possible level in the field. But they often give an impression that they don’t have feelings. This may be a wrong impression. They are just self disciplined enough to hide their emotion.
First, he told me he had a good news that I didn’t have MS, brain tumour or any neurological condition. So I answered that was good. Then, he though I misheard him or something. He repeated the same sentence. I answered the same, “That’s good.”
Since he stared at my face for a while, I guessed that he wasn’t expecting me to respond to the news well. He briefly asked if I was managing my life. Although I struggle with keeping up with basic housekeeping tasks and I am mainly bed ridden, it still categorised as I am managing my life according to his classification.
He was still concerned about the symptoms I am having. And started to explain that the symptoms I have without any physical evidence are often caused by psychological issues. He used the word “Functional Disorder”, and I knew it was a new term for Conversion Disorder , which is another controversial psychological condition. He was about to recommend me to see a psychiatrist.
I told him that I understood what he was telling me, but I believed that my mind is functioning fine. My symptoms are physical and I know it is not psychological. I am not making it up.
He was persistent and tried to explain that my life must have lots of problems. Even I don’t feel being depressed; the stresses I am having can cause troubles and there can be issues from childhood. I had to disagree with him.
I once again explained that I had seen psychiatrists and one of them wrote a letter to my GP at the time that I was doing well and didn’t need to see him anymore.
“How about psychologist? Psychiatrist and psychologist are different.” My first psychiatrist more like acted as psychologist. The second one was more like giving diagnosis to sell more drugs. So I really didn’t feel there will be any improvements in my physical condition from seeing a psychologist.
My speech was really struggling. I was stuttering and slurring badly. He raised his eye blow and really stared at my face. He was thinking psychosomatic. But I didn’t care what he was thinking of me. It is impossible for anyone to understand me in just 10 minutes, anyway.
Let me tell you about one of “my” understandings of psychosomatic. Smiling and laughing are psychosomatic. These are reaction of emotion and sensory stimuli. They make our facial and abdominal mascles to constrict, change heart rates and blood flow. The excitements we feel may be enforced by some hormone secretion. Sometimes, we get pain from laughing hard, trouble with breathing or even wet our pants. Although nobody complains about it medically, it could be an example of psychosomatic, couldn’t it?
I told him that working with the psychiatrists didn’t help my physical condition. And my health had deteriorated badly from anti-depressants.
He kept going on. “But the situation must have changed since then.”
Well, since then, I’m coping with my life better even though there were stressful events. I have strong will power and my mind is fine. I just don’t know how to convince him, but I’m sure that my mind is functioning okay. My GP can also tell him that. I’ve also past the intense grieving.
“Grieving? What do you mean by that?”
This question actually made me realise that this Neurologist has no idea about psychotherapy. From my explanation what chronically ill people have to go through emotionally, he might have realised that I know what I was talking about.
I was not in denial. I doubt about the psychotherapy based on my own efforts and negative experience with it. One thing I’m sure is that I’m not going to allow myself to the psychological abuse and torture anymore.
It seemed he was confused and puzzled.
“So, what are you going to do now?”
This question rather shocked me. I was hoping that HE was giving me the answer. Now that I know he didn’t find any physical evidence, he cannot help me. There is no point for me to push him to help. It is something like I’m begging to a butcher to sell me cake.
It also daunted on me that there is nobody who can really help me.
I slowly started… Although I made a peace with my condition, I don’t want to live like this for the rest of my life. I had to push down my tears. The Neurologist was looking at me and nodded that he agrees.
I just didn’t have the answer to his question except for one.
“Hope…”
I know there are some researches going on. I hope that one day something will come out. I hope that I will get better one day.
That’s all I had. He was looking into my eyes now.
He looked back at his computer screen and told me that he was going to write a letter to the referring doctor. He asked me for one last time.
“Are you sure that you are okay with this?”
I didn’t really have any other options. But I knew there was no way this Neurologist could help my condition. I said yes.
Probably his ego was hurting that he didn’t have anything to recommend me. But it is not really his fault. He didn’t have the right knowledge. At this moment, nobody really has the right knowledge to treat my condition. I still respect Neurologists. They have put lots of efforts to become one. And they are helping many patients with other neurological illnesses.
I shook his hand to say thank you.
It was still beneficial for me that I now have a certainty that I don’t have MS or brain tumour. I’m grateful for my GP’s recommendation for MRI. And It was worthy of the efforts.
Little negative is that I now have nothing that give me hope for treatment.
Posted by Rachel M.
When I entered into the Neurologist’s office with the support by hospital staff, the first question he asked was, “How did it happen? Like showing up at day clinic on a stretcher?”
I will blog about it separately.
The Neurologist wasn’t the same doctor I saw at the initial consultation. The hospital staff who took me to the Out Patient Department and made sure that I would land on patient chair in the doctor’s office safe and sound, told me that a registerer Neurologist was scheduled to see me. The way she told me, I assumed that the “registerer” holds much better qualification than just a Neurologist.
He was a young and well dressed doctor. The one word to explain about him is “elite”. I like intelligent people. But I don’t think I can say the same for elite people. Elite people can be an art of human beings who has achieved the highest possible level in the field. But they often give an impression that they don’t have feelings. This may be a wrong impression. They are just self disciplined enough to hide their emotion.
First, he told me he had a good news that I didn’t have MS, brain tumour or any neurological condition. So I answered that was good. Then, he though I misheard him or something. He repeated the same sentence. I answered the same, “That’s good.”
Since he stared at my face for a while, I guessed that he wasn’t expecting me to respond to the news well. He briefly asked if I was managing my life. Although I struggle with keeping up with basic housekeeping tasks and I am mainly bed ridden, it still categorised as I am managing my life according to his classification.
He was still concerned about the symptoms I am having. And started to explain that the symptoms I have without any physical evidence are often caused by psychological issues. He used the word “Functional Disorder”, and I knew it was a new term for Conversion Disorder , which is another controversial psychological condition. He was about to recommend me to see a psychiatrist.
I told him that I understood what he was telling me, but I believed that my mind is functioning fine. My symptoms are physical and I know it is not psychological. I am not making it up.
He was persistent and tried to explain that my life must have lots of problems. Even I don’t feel being depressed; the stresses I am having can cause troubles and there can be issues from childhood. I had to disagree with him.
I once again explained that I had seen psychiatrists and one of them wrote a letter to my GP at the time that I was doing well and didn’t need to see him anymore.
“How about psychologist? Psychiatrist and psychologist are different.” My first psychiatrist more like acted as psychologist. The second one was more like giving diagnosis to sell more drugs. So I really didn’t feel there will be any improvements in my physical condition from seeing a psychologist.
My speech was really struggling. I was stuttering and slurring badly. He raised his eye blow and really stared at my face. He was thinking psychosomatic. But I didn’t care what he was thinking of me. It is impossible for anyone to understand me in just 10 minutes, anyway.
Let me tell you about one of “my” understandings of psychosomatic. Smiling and laughing are psychosomatic. These are reaction of emotion and sensory stimuli. They make our facial and abdominal mascles to constrict, change heart rates and blood flow. The excitements we feel may be enforced by some hormone secretion. Sometimes, we get pain from laughing hard, trouble with breathing or even wet our pants. Although nobody complains about it medically, it could be an example of psychosomatic, couldn’t it?
I told him that working with the psychiatrists didn’t help my physical condition. And my health had deteriorated badly from anti-depressants.
He kept going on. “But the situation must have changed since then.”
Well, since then, I’m coping with my life better even though there were stressful events. I have strong will power and my mind is fine. I just don’t know how to convince him, but I’m sure that my mind is functioning okay. My GP can also tell him that. I’ve also past the intense grieving.
“Grieving? What do you mean by that?”
This question actually made me realise that this Neurologist has no idea about psychotherapy. From my explanation what chronically ill people have to go through emotionally, he might have realised that I know what I was talking about.
I was not in denial. I doubt about the psychotherapy based on my own efforts and negative experience with it. One thing I’m sure is that I’m not going to allow myself to the psychological abuse and torture anymore.
It seemed he was confused and puzzled.
“So, what are you going to do now?”
This question rather shocked me. I was hoping that HE was giving me the answer. Now that I know he didn’t find any physical evidence, he cannot help me. There is no point for me to push him to help. It is something like I’m begging to a butcher to sell me cake.
It also daunted on me that there is nobody who can really help me.
I slowly started… Although I made a peace with my condition, I don’t want to live like this for the rest of my life. I had to push down my tears. The Neurologist was looking at me and nodded that he agrees.
I just didn’t have the answer to his question except for one.
“Hope…”
I know there are some researches going on. I hope that one day something will come out. I hope that I will get better one day.
That’s all I had. He was looking into my eyes now.
He looked back at his computer screen and told me that he was going to write a letter to the referring doctor. He asked me for one last time.
“Are you sure that you are okay with this?”
I didn’t really have any other options. But I knew there was no way this Neurologist could help my condition. I said yes.
Probably his ego was hurting that he didn’t have anything to recommend me. But it is not really his fault. He didn’t have the right knowledge. At this moment, nobody really has the right knowledge to treat my condition. I still respect Neurologists. They have put lots of efforts to become one. And they are helping many patients with other neurological illnesses.
I shook his hand to say thank you.
It was still beneficial for me that I now have a certainty that I don’t have MS or brain tumour. I’m grateful for my GP’s recommendation for MRI. And It was worthy of the efforts.
Little negative is that I now have nothing that give me hope for treatment.