I Know I am no Joyce Echaquan, but.......

 

My mental health was fragile this morning.  It became extremely fragile after a phone call from the Registered Dietitian who is also a Certified Diabetes Educator from my Primary Care Clinic.  It took me a while to get it back from extremely fragile to just fragile.  I am grateful that the WRHA has a Mobile Crisis Service.  I called and received a compassionate and excellent intervention.  This story is humiliating to share and I am only doing so because I don't want another person, who may even be more fragile than me, to experience this. 

The RD called me to inform me that she was calling at the request of my NP.  I am familiar with the RD and I know she doesn't like me.  Of course, that will be denied by the RD, but, trust me, when you have mental illness you develop super-powers to help you navigate life. My super-power is that I know when someone doesn't like me. 

Regardless, she was phoning to share my lab result and my A1C. The result was shared and I acknowledged that this was high but it was lower than my last one so I was happy that my extra efforts were showing results.  She told me I was wrong.  It was not lower and then she said she could "prove" that to me because she had all of my records there on the computer.  (I actually teach customer service for health care professionals and I can assure you that telling someone that they are wrong and that you can "prove" that sets an unnecessary adversarial tone.)

So, she checked and then confirmed that I had been correct that it had gone down, however, it was still too high and told me that I needed to book a phone appointment with her or another option to discuss.  (I had previous appointments with her and the other option in the past).  I said it wasn't a question of knowing what to do, it was a question of actually doing it, and I was doing the best I could at present. 

She said that some people hear these lab results and choose to do something and others decide to do nothing but she recommended that I do something by making an appointment with her, the other option, and then she added a third option. (That comment triggered a panic attack. I didn't want to be judged as something who was doing nothing.)  I asked if I could have a couple of days to think about it. She said she would certainly record that I wasn't prepared to do anything but that she had done her job and reported the results and politely hung up.  

As I am writing this, it seems trivial.  It sounds trivial, even to me, but it didn't a few hours ago when I was having a panic attack and phoned Mobile Crisis.  This healthcare professional told me I was wrong, I was lazy, I was unmotivated, I wasn't grateful for her call and her skills, and that I am a bad person.  I know she didn't say some of those words, but, that is what I heard.  She also told me that she was going to document that she was great and I wasn't.  You have no idea what it is like to be vulnerable and NEED services to have the threat of someone "documenting" that you are "difficult".  I just don't need that dog whistle at this time.  

When I got off the phone, after I got over feeling profoundly disrespected, I have switched to wondering about her speaking the same way to other patients, perhaps even more vulnerable or fragile than I am.  

I am a patient at the Primary Care Clinic at Access Winnipeg West.  I have an extraordinary Nurse Practitioner and I have seen other professionals as well.  I understand that they all have access to my electronic records.  I don't particularly like that but I accept it.  But, it wasn't helpful when one of my counselors said, "We talked about your case at a team meeting, and we couldn't believe that....."  It wasn't helpful to me when the RD repeated back what I had disclosed in my DBT skills group.  I was already aware of what I had disclosed.  It wasn't helpful to me when the Pharmacist and her clinical intern had told me that they had reviewed my records and were impressed with my struggle to get into a respite facility. As the person who had been struggling to get into a respite facility, it wasn't helpful that another health care professional was aware, and wasn't going to help.  It wasn't helpful to find out that a personal note that I wrote to my NP has been scanned into my file. It is really hard to complain because that complaint will be in my medical file.  

Here is the thing.  I have more than one diagnosis of mental illness.  There are days when my mental illness does not effect my life.  Those are days are called the past.  Right now, for a number of reasons, I am struggling with my mental health and I am very fragile.  I have other diagnoses including GERD, diabetes, and obesity.  I know that when people look at me, they see someone who is lazy, unmotivated, and at fault for being obese.  (It actually has more to do with the asshat whose only mistake he made was not killing me during an otherwise flawless and particularly brutal sexual assault.) Anyway, I understand this because when my life was "perfect", I judged others the same way. The first thing that my partner's mother said when introduced as his girlfriend was, "I don't approve because you are too fat." That hurt but I understand her judgement.  I just don't expect that same judgement from my health care team.  

I don't want an apology.  I know the RD will have "carefully documented" the conversation from her perspective and it will reflect that she did nothing wrong.  What I hope is that I have no further contact with her and that she no longer have access to my file.