I am in a real bad mood, and I am going to vent today.
I sure hope you don’t mind. If so, you might want to stop reading.
About a year ago, I developed some issues with my back. The main issue was a severely herniated disc in my lower back (atL5/S1, for those who might want to know exactly what part of my back.) I ended up spending a good deal of time in the hospital. In two hospitals, actually. At my local hospital, I saw a man who is considered to be one of the best neurosurgeons in the area, at least according to my primary care physician. Dr. X ( I will call him that because with my luck I will get sued for slander or libel or something for the things I say here, much of which will not be positive) saw me the day after Thanksgiving. After looking over my chart and the results of an MRI, he informed me that I needed to have surgery. Without the surgery, he said that I would be paralyzed from the waist down.
And then he told me that he could not perform the surgery because of my weight. He said that I would need to loseatleast150 pounds in order for him to operate. He didn’t suggest I go somewhere else, he didn’t say that another doctor or another hospital might be able to help. He said that he couldn’t perform the operation and left the impression that if he couldn’t do it no one could.
About 10 days later, I was in the ER of another hospital, a teaching hospital about a 30 minutes drive from where I live. The doctors there could see that I needed surgery and were surprised that the first doctor refused to do anything. After the surgery, I felt better but found that there were things I could not do. I had no feeling from my waist to my upper thigh, which meant no control of certain bodily functions. The surgeon who did perform the surgery said that it is possible but unlikely that I will get those sensations and feelings back.
After discussing things with my husband, I decided to contact a lawyer. Initially, the lawyer felt that I had a very strong case. Under state law, she needed a medical expert to back up the claims of malpractice, to agree that Dr. X behaved in a bad manner.
Today, I received a letter from the lawyer saying that there is no expert evidence that the doctor did anything wrong, so she is closing my case file.
I am so angry right now!! There are so many things that I want to say that I can’t, because they are so not nice things to say. I feel like Dr. X got away with discriminating against me because of my weight. He acted like he thought he was God, and he was the only possible person who could do the surgery. Since he couldn’t do it, obviously it could not be done. And that is all because of my weight. I mean, I KNOW that I am overweight. That is why I had weight loss surgery in the first place. It’s not like I am just sitting around, allowing myself to be fat. Before the back issues, I was working out daily and really TRYING to lose the excess weight.
He made me feel like I am less of a person because I am not at the “ideal weight” for a person my height. I absolutely HATE the way that feels!!! I just want him to feel, even if only for a moment, the humiliation that he made me feel. I am so ANGRY about this!!!! It is not fair that ANYONE should be treated that way.