When I was in my 40s I was having very long and heavy periods. I went to the ob-gyn and he gave me a very cursury exam and pronounced "Lose a hundred pounds and I'll do hysterectomy" and walked out of the room. I mentioned my problem to my Internist and he sent me to another Dr. who did a cone biopsy. The results were I had endometrial cancer and needed the hysterectomy.Because of the prejudice of the ob-gyn I could have died of cancer.Fortunately it was caught in time. I could not believe that Dr.s attitude just because I was fat! I also went to an orthopedic surgeon because I have 2 compressed discs in my back. Of course the first thing he said to me was lose weight and the second was how much did I weigh? I told him 250 lbs and he said "You look like you weigh more." On the way out of his office he made me get on the scale to see how much I weighed. He might as well have come out and called me a liar. Thats what he wanted to do but couldn't because I weighed 250. The attitudes of these Dr.s just point out why many overweight people don't want to go to the Dr. Tell us some of your Dr. horror stories.

Love, Kathy

Down 50 lbs. YEA!

Several years ago I was seeing an endocrinologist who prescribed metformin, meridia and xenical. I had made more progress on that formula of drugs plus good diet/exercise than any other weight loss plan ever. I had even downgraded my diabetes to just "insulin resistance." I was just 30 pounds from the "normal" range, which was my personal goal of 130. Well, he said, "Don't you want to get down to 105 pounds?" That was a big slap in the face since I'd never been so healthy and close to my goal. I never went back to him again. (My PCP took me off the meridia and xenical after awhile because the long term effects weren't known. I gained everything back, and then some.)

On a previous occasion I confided in that same endocrinologist that I was feeling depressed and that I'd like to get back into therapy. He offered that his wife was an excellent therapist, but I should know that she's very thin, so she might not be good for me. I just ignored him. How condescending to imply that my mental state was completely about my weight. It's about my father, you idiot! Not some skinny lady! (I now happen go to a therapist who is very thin, but my sessions are about me, which has nothing to do with the way she looks.)

I had my surgery in Mexico, and when I got back home, began having complications. I had to go into an extended hours clinic and they paged the surgeon on call. He barely took a glipse at my stomach and told me it was inflammation and it'd go away.

His bedside manor was horrible and treated me as though I was wasting his time. He said "Well, what is it that you want me to do for you?" He ended up leaving the room and the nurse came back in. I told her that I really wasn't comfortable w/ his "diagnosis" and was afraid there was something more to it. She stepped out in the hallway to ask him to take a second look and he said "That's her fault for going to Mexico!", clearly where everyone in the office could hear him. I was so embarressed. I just got up and left w/out even checking out. Whether it was my fault or not, he's not there to judge, he's there to treat.

Come to find out, it wasn't inflammation at all. It was a very serious and potentially fatal infection. Thank goodness I FINALLY found a dr that actually took the time to culture it.

I once went to the ER with severe chest pains and arrythmia. The doctor started to take my blood pressure, but the cuff was tight on me......he threw it on the floor and yelled at the nurse, "Bring me an elephant cuff!" My b.p. was not terriby high at that momen, and he said, "You're just like my wife...nothing wrong with you but being too fat." and sent me home.

There have been many times when I did not go to the doctor when I should have because I knew what their first 'diagnosis' would be.....got a hangnail? Lose weight. Got a should pain? Lose weight. Etc Etc.

ALL MY PREVIOUS DOCTORS WERE LIKE THIS.... AND i always went to get a new one after a while of thier degrading manners...

my current pcp... well didn't want me to have surgery, and was completelyagainst it... she even argued my surgeon.... (thank god he believed in me and did the surgery anyway)...

But i decided to stay with her because i wanted to prove to her how successful i could be... and how people could benefit from this surgery... (she doesnt believe in WLS) Maybe future patients of hers wont have to argue with her...

And almost a year later she is thrilled at my results!!!:frown:

I went to my PCP two years ago and asked for diet pills. He refused to give them to me and said, "Your only hope is the gastric bypass surgery. You will NEVER lose the weight you have to lose without surgery. You can try every diet in the book but it will not work for you. Your case is hopeless, so without the gastric bypass, you might as well keep eating what you want until you die, because that is exactly what is going to happen if you don't get the gastric bypass surgery." I said, "What about the Lap-Band?" He replied, "The Lap-Band would NEVER work for you, you are way too big for the band to be effective. Your case requires extreme measures, so don't even waste yur time or money on the Lap-band because you are far too out of control for the band to work. You would just eat around the band and never get proper aftercare because of your fierce addiction to food."

I was unable to walk away after that conversation without cursing him out, so let's just say that my PCP is no longer my PCP, and he learned a few "new" words that day. I will not elaborate on WHAT the "new" words were, but I will tell you that when you are truly PISSED, you can make up some doozies from a combination of "not socially appropriate" four-letter, foul words. :hurray:

OMG........He so deserved every word...

I'm sorry i hope your new PCP is giving you the care you and all of us deserve...

Dr. are supposed to be compassionate and respectful towards us... not to ridicule us for our weight.

I went to the Dr with complaints of not being able to sleep, ankle pain, some sort of allergies and being new to the Houston area for some reason I was having problems breathing.

He said "Ruby, first of all you are very over weight. you need to loose weight and all your problems will get better."

I said "I've never had allergies and I never have had trouble breathing as for my weight is there something you would recommend?"

He said "step away from the table and stop eating fast food"

I never saw him again!

As it turned out.. it's very common for people in Houston to develop asthma due to all the smog. Coming from a small town and moving to Houston will I naturally got sick. My ankles were hurting cause of all the walking I was doing from the public bus stop to my job. And as for my allergies will I'm allergic to certain pollens which are very strong and common here. which brought me to the lack of sleep, the allergies were so severe that it was keeping me awake.

Now I know I was overweight but I asked in hopes he would give me some good advise. Oh well.

Many years ago I was having horrible pain in my legs - - could not walk far or even stand very long. I finally got up the courage to see a surgeon who told me I just needed to lose some weight. I cried all the way home and then suffered for several more years before I finally got up the courage to see another surgeon who quickly scheduled me for disk fusion. Thankfully it was successful and I have not had any problems with pain since. Makes me sick for all of the years I suffered needlessly!

When I was still skinny, like 5'4" and 135 pounds, my doctor told me to lose 10 pounds. No wonder I believed I was fat even when I was thin.

That happened to me to, I was deep in a eating disorder and drug abuse at the time, and weighed 140, on my very muscular 5'6 frame, EVERYONE I knew thought I was sick because I was so thin looking, and a doctor who knew me for 5 minutes told me, I neede to get alot more exercise and lose another 20 - 30 pounds. (GAWD, if only that was my only problem at the time!)

Also, I once went to the emergency room for severe stomach cramps, an after a few labs, the doctor came in the room threw all his papers on the floor, and said, "If you're here for drugs, you can leave now before I call the police." (I had marijuana in my blood work, this was a long time ago, clean now) I was scared bad, so I left, but my husband (boyfriend at the time) took me to another hospital where they found I had a lodged kidney stone that I could have died from.

That whole situation was really tramatic for me, and I rarely see a doctor unless absolutely necessary now.

BUT, I have to add, my Obstetrician, Dr. Goerish in Mankato, MN was a doll, a tiny little 95 pound beauty, scared me to death with her eyes and professionalism. She calmed me down, dried my tears, telling me it was ok to gain weight when I was pregnant (and newly banded). I couldn't have prayed for a better doctor, I think of her often... and smile...

Gees. This thread makes me want to cry. But you know - it's stories like these that have scared me into staying away from doctors. But I haven't had a single doctor tell me I was too heavy...at least nothing I can remember. And yes - I looked fat at 233 and my heaviest, 240.

I've stayed away from getting a gyno check up for 4 years because I didn't want to get a comment about my weight - I already knew I was heavy and my mental state couldn't have handled it. When I got pregnant, I was TERRIFIED to make an OB appointment because I didn't want a snide comment. The OB turned out to be this incredibly skinny lady and I thought for sure she'd say something...she never did.

I wish doctors could be educated on sensitivity when it comes to this because it's not like people don't KNOW they are overweight. It's the bad ones that ruin it for everybody. I'm REALLY glad I never ran into this bias because I seriously probably would have burst into tears. I don't like getting comments about being fat.

My bariatric nutritionist asked me, "So how much do you want to lose?" I told her and she immediately looked at me and said, "You realize that's not realistic, right?" I could have smacked her.

in 1995 when i had awful abdominal pain my gp told me it was "because you are fat". i changed docs, found out i had gallstones, had my gallbladder removed and the pain went away... and i was still fat! never been back to him since.

t

When I got my gall bladder out in 1990, I asked the surgeon what the procedure was that he did to me. He said, "You don't need to know what it's called. It's too complicated for you to understand." Turns out it was an edoscopy.

OK, so when I had my vision tested a few years ago, I met the doctor with the worst bed-side manner imaginable. Among several snide remarks he made about my weight, like not being able to fit in his exam chair (which I did), he told me my vision was bad because my eyelids were fat. (I do not have a fat face). He also said it was due to getting old (I was in my early 30s). A few years later, I found out just what a jerk this guy was. Me and my friends joined a gym across the street from this doctor's office and he was also a member there. He was constantly rude to people, like telling them to get out of the swim lane so he could do his laps because he a was a doctor (an optometrist) and his time was more important. I should mention here that he uses a prosthetic leg. He pissed off one of my friends so bad, that one day, in the pool room, he tossed his towel over the good doctor's artificial leg while the doctor was swimming and took the leg into the locker room and put it in a locker, then split. We heard all about what happened next because another friend who looked like the perp was accused of the crime. He was out of town though, so they never found out who the leg-knapper was. Herr doktor threw an absolute hissy fit (all the people that worked there hated this a-hole) and made one of the workers carry him across the street to his office. If I didn't hate the guy so much, I would think this is the cruelest prank ever, but the guy is lucky someone hasn't burned his house down yet, with him in it. They found his leg the next day, by the way. It was only after this event that I told my friends about my eye exam experience.

OK, so when I had my vision tested a few years ago, I met the doctor with the worst bed-side manner imaginable.<<snipped>>

OMG that has to be the funniest story I have ever heard! :biggrin:

WOW Zippy! What a story! I was just thinking about how what DR's say have an impact on us and usually they don't think before speaking (some of them)!

When I was diagnosed with PCOS 10 years ago, the dr told me that I would never have children. I was devastated! He was obviously not well read on the subject!!

I was an athlete throughout HS and college. I 5'11.5 and was 165 in my Sophomore year of college. I played competitive volleyball and was in the gym EVERY day! I needed to have my knee fixed, so I go the Oklahoma Health Science Center, where they take care of the OU athletes-ooohhhhhh! Anyway, he taped the surgery, which was too cool, and IN the video, he is narrating and says to me, "You need to loose weight, or this surgery will be a complete and utter failure!" He didn't have the balls to tell that to me in person, but can slime away with saying it on a video of the surgery, when I'm out and can't punch him in the face! I just figured that BMI and it was 23!! What was he thinking. No wonder I have had issues with how I see myself! And I was at the top of my game, too! Anyway, enough ranting about the past.

I broke my ankle and the doctor I went to didn't see the crack on the x-ray. He pronounced that I had a bad bruise. He asked "What do you do for a living?" I replied that I was a stay at home mom with five kids, the youngest two ages 2 and 4, and he said "Good, because you are going to have to sit with your foot elevated and iced and stay off your feet for several days!" Wow, ignorant jerk! I guess he wanted to make sure I didn't have an 'important' job, like him! Two weeks later I went to a different doctor and found out my ankle was broken and I was on the verge of needing surgery to repair it. My husband proceeded to call the ignorant doctor's partner and give him a piece of his mind-told him how hard stay at home moms work, etc. and the group ended up not charging us anything.