What have we got here? We’ve got me, laid out by anemia, due to too rapid and consistent peri-menopausal blood loss.
Peri-menopause, is it a taboo subject? Is it just something men and teenagers don’t want to hear about? What about all of those male OB/GYNs? What makes them so special? Why do they want to know about it, lecture me about it, be experts in the subject of the unpredictable ebbs and torrents of my blood, the blood that comes out of my darkest place?
Is talking about menstrual blood, women’s blood, worse than talking about other blood? Is it tiresome? It’s not the same as blood from injury, soldier’s blood or surgical blood, violent blood, blood from war. Do we talk about any of it or simply leave out female blood?
I remember none of puberty, none of “developing;” just from one school year to the next I went from being teased for being flat-chested to being teased for being large-chested. Even by my girlfriends, so you know it wasn’t sexist or bullying or anything. But things are different now, right? American culture having evolved as it has, we no longer pay much attention to breasts like in the good ol’ days.
I went in to the ER last night (Tuesday), perhaps as an overreaction to the light-headedness, slight vertigo, and nerves-on-edge for 3 days-in-a-row I had been experiencing due to the aforementioned anemia and due to the urging of the MD on call the night before (Monday) to go in that night. I had some odd notion that I could get BLOOD in the ER. I wanted blood like a vampire in a gothic novel wants blood, but not the feeling sexy kind of vampire. How can a condition so purely part of my sex be so unsexy? I know the answer. I know that owning this is part of graduating out of my reproducing sexuality into the rest-of-my-life sexuality, kundalini.
I think it’s completely wrong that this is the kind of thing that is associated with female blood:
I’ve never passed out in my life. I’ve never gotten blood in my life. Neither of these things happened yesterday either.
I can tell you that when the old (65ish, male) OB/GYN had me in the stirrups and told me to relax those muscles (direct quote), I later had a fantasy (and still do) of taking my strong right leg, tensing it as hard as I could and kicking him in the face with it. Sort of twisting his head away from his spine. A suberb peri-menopausal whiplash. It could be a new reason to land in the ER, in fact.
If he hadn’t been the doctor on call and if I hadn’t already been in the care of his practice since Sunday, I would have declined his “services.” However, if I add up the number of pelvic exams I’ve had in my life, one more is a drop in the bucket. Not that I’m resemble a bucket, au contraire, but you get my meaning.
The best OB/GYN I ever had/knew (do what you will with the unfortunate double entendre), was a good friend back in Ohio. I needed an OB/GYN for all sorts of things I experienced before my pregnancies (like not being able to get pregnant for a while and miscarrying twice). I saw both my OB/GYN and my lay midwife throughout both of my pregnancies.
Until 2 years ago, I had never had an OB/GYN in Massachusetts. I simply went to my fabulous (best MD I’ve ever been in the care of) Primary Care Physician for everything OR to my acupuncturist for things less medical. Now, I have an OB/GYN practice at my disposal, but I don’t have a very comfortable relationship with anyone there. I do love the Nurse Practitioner I’ve seen once, but I don’t like the OB/GYN I saw under duress last night. Sigh.
Once in a while Wednesday–what’s it all about?
What if all it took to please me was alliteration? I would LOVE that, my life to be that simple.
Here are some words for you until we meet again:
harrowing sepulchre pulchritude
How can pulchritude refer to beauty when the sound of it reminds me so much of paltry, pustule, and that doctor from last night?
Send loving, healing, iron-filled thoughts and images my way, please. Yours, twinkly
twinklysparkles 