Dying to Be Heard.

Over the course of the past 48-days I’ve been doing just that.

Dying to be heard.

It all started on August 21st, 2020 after I’d fallen down the stairs- tripped really on some laundry that my grandmother had left there like we’d asked her not to for years because someone was going to be unfortunate enough to fall and break their leg.

It was me. I was someone.

Moments before I was laughing and joking with my girlfriend about something- though it doesn’t seem important now- and then I was laying at the bottom of our basement stairs gasping for air. I remember it in vague flashes, one second, I was laughing, and the next the world blurred.

Worried, like I think anyone would be after someone falls down the stairs, my girlfriend rushed me to the ER after I’d managed to crawl my way back up the stairs, and my little brother helped me to the car, unable to put any pressure at all on my left foot.

Now, due to Covid-19 the hospital precautions stated that I wasn’t allowed to have anyone with me, so while my girlfriend waited in the car, I sat in the waiting room until it was time for me to see someone. I sat there in a wheelchair, quietly, texting her while I waited for a doctor, for triage, for x-ray, and anyone else who wanted or needed something from me to help me.

I wore my mask, answered their questions, and I tried not to cry when they moved my food. When asked where my pain was on a scale of 1-10, I answered with an honest, solid 7. Because from where I come from, 10 means that you’re dying. My mom had cancer before she died in March of this year, and her pain was a 10, mine wasn’t. No, I couldn’t move or put pressure on my foot but, that still didn’t make my pain a 10.

After 2 and a half hours I was brought back to triage again, where the nurse wrapped my ankle, and the doctor told me that it was ‘probably’ just a sprain because he didn’t see anything on my X-Rays despite the nurse telling me I had a “hairline fracture” and then they put me in an Aircast Air-Stirrup Ankle Brace, and gave me a set of crutches that they spent less than two minutes teaching me how to use.

I never saw those X-Rays, so I don’t know what they saw, or whether or not there was any form of break or fracture.

All I know is that when I went to my family doctor 7-days later per the hospital’s instructions to “follow up” I was met with nothing but frustration. My doctor had apparently seen the X-Rays that they’d done of my foot, and without even looking at it said that I was “fine” and tried to shove a handful of antidepressants and anti-anxiety medications my way instead.

He didn’t care that the prescription for ibuprofen that the hospital had given me made me sick, or that my pain was still a very solid 7. When I told my girlfriend what the doctor had said she was absolutely appalled. It had been days since I could put weight on my foot, let alone move it at all. So, she kept pushing and eventually, on the 12th of September, I eventually went to an immediate care after work one night.

My pain and swelling were still there, even if the bruises weren’t. At this point 22-days had passed since I’d first fallen down the stairs and sustained my injury. I was scared to go to the doctor again because, he didn’t want to listen to me, and hear me out when I knew that there was something wrong but, I’m glad I did.

The immediate care did their own set of X-Rays, and even though the doctor said that he didn’t personally see anything wrong with me, he still gave me a copy of it. He also referred me to an orthopedic surgeon’s office so that I could go and get checked out because I was adamant that there was something wrong.

The ortho saw me a couple of days later, and he was really nice. My older brother took me, and the doctor gave me a real “moon boot” or the proper term for it is Breg Genesis Mid-Calf Full Shell Walker boot. It has made a huge difference in both my comfort and mobility levels, though I try to stay off it as much as I can.

He also told me that he wanted me to have an MRI despite also having seen the X-Rays from the immediate care. Unfortunately, it took a couple weeks, but my insurance finally gave me the MRI that I needed, and I had that on October 6th. I’d never had an MRI before, and let me just tell you that it was terrifying. By the time it was over I’d shed more than a few tears, my anxiety was through the roof, and I felt like I was going to jump out of my skin but, you know what? I finally got answers.

The orthopedic surgeon’s office called me yesterday, and when I heard what they had to say, my jaw hit the floor. The MRI says that I have a nondisplaced intra-articular fracture of the medial cuboid bone with additional avulsion fracture along the lateral aspect of the cuboid bone at the calcaneocuboid ligament attachment also a partial-thickness tear of the anterior talofibular ligament and the calcaneal fibular ligament. I would love to see someone say that three times fast.

Hell, I would love to see someone say that without pausing or stumbling over their words at least once because, I know I can’t.

I also know that if it weren’t for my girlfriend and my grandmother pushing me constantly to go get it checked out, to go and get another opinion, that I wouldn’t have. I would’ve kept going, carrying around my 180lbs body on fractured bones, like I’ve been doing for the past 49-days. But I also know that if I would’ve taken the advice of my family doctor, I wouldn’t have been wearing the brace, and I never would’ve found my orthopedic surgeon who gave me the walking boot.

So, my question is, why is it that doctors either misdiagnose or downplay women’s health concerns. I’ve seen it happen my whole life both watching my mom be a chronically ill woman battling with doctors to listen and understand when she said and knew something was wrong and most times, they just wouldn’t hear of it, and now with myself. I too suffer from chronic illness, and while I don’t have cancer or kidney disease like my mother did, I’m still facing the same kind of backlash and discrimination that she did.

When doctors look at me, they see a mostly healthy 25-year old female. I stand at about 5’7 on a good day, and no matter how hard I try to make it fall on the lower end, my ever fluctuating 180-190lbs classifies me as overweight. Doctors throw words like “morbidly obese” and “weight loss” at me constantly, no matter why I’m there.

Eat less, they say. Exercise, they say.

As if the root of all of my problems, the root of all evil is my weight. They don’t ask exactly what I eat in a day because, on your average Friday like today, I woke up, drank a bottle of water, and ha I’d a coffee while I was out doing the grocery shopping with my little brother. Today, my diet has consisted of two coffees, three bottled waters, a salad, and some of the casserole that I threw together this afternoon before I had to leave for work.

However, it seems like just because my problem has no solution in antidepressants or weight loss, that I must have no problem at all. Multiple studies show that if you’re not wealthy, not white, and not heterosexual, you may be receiving less than optimal health care. A University of Pennsylvania study found that women waited 16 minutes longer than men to receive pain medication when they visited an emergency room. Also women are more than likely told their pain is “psychosomatic,” and influenced by emotional distress. And in a survey of more than 2,400 women with chronic pain, 83% said that they felt they had experienced gender discrimination from their health care providers.

Maya Dusenbery, an author has written an entire manuscript called ‘Doing Harm: The Truth About How Bad Medicine and Lazy Science Leave Women Dismissed, Misdiagnosed, and Sick’ and I think its something that every woman with chronic medical issues, or anyone who loves and cares for a woman with chronic medical issues, truly needs to read.

By the time I see my orthopedic surgeon again, I will have been walking around on fractured bones for 52-days. That’s 7.42 weeks that I have been in pain, dealing with swelling, and trying to do physical therapy and rehab on my own with the help of Youtube videos because, no one wanted to listen when I originally said that there was something wrong.

I don’t think that’s right. What about my pain was so insignificant that they could not look at my x-rays, or my foot, or the swelling, and see that there was something wrong? Because I’m 25-years old? Because I’m a woman? Because I wasn’t crying and screaming or making a scene?

Do any of those things make my pain any less real?

Most women never take that “risk” to go get another opinion in fear of looking like a hypochondriac, or a drug seeker, or being looked at like she’s crazy. Without the love, support, and pushiness of my family I probably wouldn’t have sought out further help after my family doctor put the thought in my head that I was crazy.

So, if you’re out there going through the same thing I just did, stay strong. Hang in there, seek that second opinion, advocate for yourself, and do not let them make you feel like you’re crazy, or that your pain doesn’t matter.

We’re out here just dying to be heard.

-S.N.L