I also had one completely brush it off – I told him that I hadn’t had any change in problems since I had gained weight back, and that I have a long history of eating disordered behavior, both not eating and purging. His response was “that’s not how you’re supposed to lose weight.” He followed that up a moment later with “you’re a lovely young woman and you’d be even lovelier if you lost weight.” I think the look on my face at that silenced him; he proceeded to rush out of the room while I was in the middle of a question.

All that I ask is to be treated with the same respect and dignity that you offer to all of your other patients.

The article leaves out a lot, like how I saw one of the doctors at Johns Hopkins (the one that recommended cryoablation) and he based his refusal to do the surgery on ONE patient. One patient, near my size who was 30 years older and in very bad health. And that patient didn’t die, didn’t have horrid complications, they had to go to a rehab center for a few weeks following surgery to get movement and the ability to walk back.

Had I listened to him and let my tumor be cryoed the likelyhood of the kidney cancer growing further goes through the roof. I was 33 when I was diagnosed with cancer, 33. Can you imagine being given a death sentence like that?

She comes home and generally rails against her patients. She has said some things I wouldn’t say aloud to anyone.

For a while, this bothered me. After a while, I realized that, to her, the railing was a way of opening a valve full of built up pressure. People aren’t at their best when they are in pain, and then there are drug-seekers, the non-compliant and the horrible parents who come into the clinic. And then there are the constant threats of lawsuits.

That this kind of venting leads to — or feeds — a practice of dismissal, disregard and outright discrimination is frightening.

We talk about it from time to time. But i walk softly on this issue with her.