I don't think they're saying their experiences with the medical profession is better, though I could be wrong. I read that they were saying, "You're kinda calling my friend/family member a jerk, whether or not you mean to, and that hurts. Please stop."

Also, they said once before that it hurt when people said those things, and yet people continued on without acknowledging that.

thanks, DJ. Yes, exactly.

Eh, I have lots of medical professionals in my family, but that has no bearing on who's been available for me when I've needed to see a doctor.

What it has done, however, is given me the vocabulary to speak to specialists at least. I'm still kind of crap at talking to GPs. Specialists, I'm more comfortable with, because they're looking at something specific, and I know what they need to know and speak their language.

GPs... tend to tell me what I already know, although the last one was really sweet and earnest about it.

Hubby and I have been blessed with very good doctors. The only idiot we ever had was a new resident at the walk-in clinic who was kind of baffled by a skin ailment and tried to dazzle us with Latin bullshit. "Oh, this is a case of bipedal monomanual dermititis, we should be able to take care of this." Hubby and I looked at each other. "Two foot," I said, and Hubby said, "One hand," we looked at the doctor: "skin damage?" The doctor paled: "You know Latin?" "Yes." He scurried out and his supervisor came back a few minutes later to finish talking to us. I think the resident couldn't cope with poor people with educations.

I compare that guy to the very top-flight electrocardiologist who accidentally punched a hole through the side of Hubby's heart and who personally got Hubby's stuff from his room and hand carried it to the new room in Cardiac Critical Care at 2 AM. I always liked him, he had a Buddha shrine in his operating room.

I think it is worth noting that Katie Bee hasn't said this"You shouldn't be upset and here's why..." after her comment, she actually hasn't said anything. Which could have several interpretations, one of which is that she hasn't been back here.

yet people continued on without acknowledging that.

I don't really know what else to say. Katie Bee made the original statement, and she's not here to address this.

I said that I read her statement as hyperbole. I'm sorry that my reading of her statement as an understandable exaggeration is hurtful to lisah, Drew, and anyone else who has a connection to medical professionals.

Also, they said once before that it hurt when people said those things, and yet people continued on without acknowledging that.

To me, the way it was framed felt dismissive of the concerns behind it, frankly. I mean, yes, I twinge a little when people rail against the chosen profession of either of my parents.

But also for me, any hurt that comes from having medical professionals in my family (HI MOM!) is frankly outweighed (ugh, sorry for that term) by the fact that neither my father nor sister have been comfortable with seeing doctors on a regular basis because of lectures about their weight. I hate living with the fear that they'll lose years because they skip basic health care because of the way the medical establishment has framed things. Hell, I chickened out on a follow up appointment with my GP recently because I'd gained weight and couldn't stomach a lecture.

So I guess the defensiveness is tempered severely by knowing where the pain's coming from.

No, she didn't. But it seemed to me that several other people were saying that.

Honestly, there are ways to rant without resorting to blanket statements like "all ----- are mean people who suck."

Especially in this format, IN WRITING, when we have the time to look at our words and consider how they might affect the people reading them, there's really no excuse for a statement that broadly insulting. Try substituting almost any other word in that sentence for "doctors" and then tell me I shouldn't take offense. Put "teachers" in there. Put "Christians" in there. Tell me how it sounds to you now.

"Oh, by *all* I obviously didn't mean *you*" is just about my least favorite statement in the world. It's a bullshit way of avoiding saying "I'm sorry, I was angry and I overstepped."

[eta: And I should mention that my last paragraph is not directed at Katie, who hasn't been back in thread since her original post.]

I'm not saying people who hate doctors don't have perfectly reasoned reasons to do just that. I'm saying your friend just told you that it felt like a gut punch when put that way. And it's difficult, because this is a conversation amongst a bunch of people who wander in and out, and we all want to stick up for the point of view we identify with. I'm just saying the gut punch is as deserving of understanding and sympathy as doctor fear and loathing.