Medical Journals
On 4th of December 2022, while I was crying my eyes out on the bus making my way back to my halls from the Urgent care facility in Kings College London, I had come to the conclusion that I did not trust a medical professional in London. Not the receptionists (your god forsaken attitude, no one is there because they want to be!), not the doctors (shove your god complexes up your asses please), not the GPs, and especially not the paramedics. I was distraught enough to make the decision to not let them touch me, even if I were bleeding out to death.
I want you to know why.
***
8th November 2022
My very first appointment with the GP.
There was a person who was having issues with getting seen by a healthcare professional, something about the receptionists giving the wrong information to the GP. They were angry, frustrated and very tired. I didn’t understand why, yet anyways.
The GP was amazing. She was kind, understanding and tried. However, maybe it was exhaustion, maybe it was a sincere mistake, they had put in someone else’s details in the referral sheet. Someone else’s name, phone number, NHS number, their address. It was someone else’s details.
6pm in the night was too late in the night for me to notice details like this. I went home. The next day was when I noticed.
On the 9th of November 2022, I went in to get the forms corrected. The receptionist was on the phone. Respectfully I stood to the side, awaiting her notice. In the middle of the conversation she calls me closer, tells me to sit down and wait. Condescendingly talks about how I should wait till she completes her phone call.
Patiently waiting, I notice that other people who had just walked in were being spoken to before me. Not making any kind of fuss I just got up and stood in line. When my turn came, the lady threw a tantrum about how she couldn’t hear me. She was fine listening to the two men before me. In fact, she was even patient with the man just before me when she had to repeat details multiple times.
When I tried explaining to her that the details were wrong, she told me to show my id. I didn’t have my id on hand. I sincerely did not expect to need my id because it was not a spelling mistake. IT WAS SOMEONE ELSE’S DETAILS! She was rude, disrespectful and I felt… like dirt.
“How can we trust you? Anyone can walk in and tell us this. Anyone can do this!” She flapped the page around.
When I went to reconfirm what she needed as I did not want to not get something, she seemed frustrated.
Got my passport, spoke to someone else this time. They didn’t need my passport. They took the forms though, telling me that they would call back.
***
15th November 2022
My knees have been getting progressively worse since January of this year. Well, all my joints actually. My knees are the only ones I kind of have to acknowledge.
I called 111 because I would be damned before I spoke to that receptionist again about a GP appointment. The volunteer lady who spoke to me first was worried. The GP who spoke to me after called the pain overuse.
I am 20. I should not be finding it painful to walk from my bed to the kitchen counter. Then again, whatever. Overuse it is.
***
21st November 2022
I was experiencing pain in my surgical scars. Have been experiencing it for a while now. My gastroenterologist in India had ignored it. But now, it hurt to breathe. I couldn’t ignore it anymore.
With all the courage I had gathered in the last five days, I called the GP practice. I spoke to the same receptionist who made me feel less than. Frustrated sighs is what I got in return. “Have you filled up the 111 online form,” she asked. I didn’t know I had to fill it up. Told her I would.
Halfway through filling up the form, the form told me to call the GP Practice or go to the A&E/Urgent Care. I called the GP Practice. The same receptionist picked up the call. She told me, “I don’t know what your emergency is but our emergencies are booked for the next 2 weeks.” She didn’t ask me what was wrong with me, or what my emergency was or what I could do to access any kind of medical help.
I went to University Hospital Lewisham. Got seen by a nurse. She was nice. Went on a tangent about how her kid had achalasia as well. And how they had to get that sorted right after his birth. Spoke to me about my symptoms, told me that overuse is not a diagnosis and I had get that checked. Was prescribed blood tests. I don’t know what those blood tests were or what they showed till this day.
The nurse drawing my blood was exhausted, probably why I didn’t care that she stabbed me with a cannula needle trying to draw my blood. She was having difficulty finding a vein.
It’s normal for me. The detection of a vein is something they always find hard, and stab me a few times because of this inability a lot of the times. She removed the needle, tried drawing blood from the back of my palm. I flinched because it hurt. She scolded me for an involuntary action. Holding my hand down, held my tongue as well for she was drained. Me making a fuss would do no one any good.
Waited for two more hours. The doctor told me that the pain is probably nerve regeneration. That I should go back to my GP to get it investigated in detail. Probably change GP services. Read up about how the system works. I did, for the past six months. Even spoke to people who live here about the Nhs. Didn’t realise the absolute chaos of a system I was willingly walking into.
Because of my age she didn’t want to give me anything stronger than paracetamol. Took the two pills. My throat hated me for it, my body hated me more. The pain didn’t decrease though.
Still don’t know what those blood tests said.
***
29th November 2022
Had a therapy session. Mentioned the mess I have been in to my therapist. She took note of the referral sheet kerfuffle. Sent the GP Practice an email. The GP Practice got back to me that day. Asked me to upload the referral sheet that I gave to them at their request. Told me that they would call back once they found out whom I handed the sheet in to, and where the sheets went.
Yet to receive a call.
***
2nd December 2022
I got hit by a bicyclist while coming back from central London. The bus driver was negligent. Did not stop the bus properly at the bus stop. There was about 4 feet in between the bus stop and the bus. While I was getting down the bicyclist hit me.
Because I am short and my knees hurt, I bend lower when I get down. The bicyclist’s handle (I presume) hit the left side of my head. Getting up I walked, sat down at the bus stop. I did not want to cry. I needed to not cry but I cried. I cried and cried and cried. Called my roommate because I needed someone on the phone, someone I knew. They picked up. Spoke to me for a little. My tears abated, for a little while.
Caught the next bus, went back to the halls. I knew trauma, I knew pain, I knew shock. All I needed to do was put one step in front of the other. All I needed to do is this one thing, go back to my halls. It didn’t matter if I died after that, I needed to go back to my hall.
I did that. Changed because my Achalasia, scoliosis and every bloody thing else was flaring up. My roommates were concerned. I didn’t look normal. I wasn’t bruising because I didn’t bruise. It was either blood gushing out or nothing else. I never bruised. I wasn’t bruised but I was sensitive to light, my ears were ringing, my head hurt, my eyes hurt, light hurt. Everything was loud, noisy. Everything was overwhelming.
They called the ambulance. The paramedics came. Called this a minor injury. Didn’t do any of the brain injury checks. Gaslit me into thinking it was minor. Used the fact that I came back home and changed against me. Or the fact that I was wearing slippers instead of something that kept my feet warmer and left. I wouldn’t have noticed if my disabled flatmates didn’t tell me that I wasn’t overreacting.
The next day my head still hurt. The left side of my nose tingled. It was a little hard to breathe. I still have those symptoms. They are not my normal symptoms. I have had head aches since I was 9. I have different types of headaches. I know every single one of them. They are classified, the scary ones, the semi scary ones, the normal daily ones. Even the scary ones weren’t scary because I knew them. But this one, this one I didn’t know. I was petrified.
Went to campus support. I did not want to call an ambulance. Reluctantly I agreed to call an ambulance. The paramedics came. Asked me why I didn't try paracetamol. Explained to them that paracetamol didn’t work for all people, especially not for chronically ill and in pain people. They sat down, took my medical history. The way the man was asking for my symptoms it was clear he suspected I had a flare up I didn’t know was a flare up.
They took my vitals, said they looked okay. Told me my options, I chose the 111 GP calling me back one. Waited for one hour, the paramedic was not able to catch hold of them. They booked me a taxi. I went to Kings College Hospital.
The nurse who took down my details told me to go to the urgent care. Waited there for one and half hour, maybe two. The very same nurse came, apologised, told me to get checked in to the A&E. Half an hour later, my name was called on the intercom requesting me to come to the urgent care section. No one was there at the urgent care reception. I didn’t know which room to go to. So I waited. I waited for two more hours. The doctor came out, asked me whom I was waiting for. Asked for my name, told me she called me twice. I tried explaining to her what happened.
We went into her cabin, she sat me down. I explained to her. She looked annoyed. Said, “I must say, your head injury isn’t impressive enough. Have you tried paracetamol or ibuprofen?” I told her I couldn’t take those because of my chronic illnesses and how they reacted to the medication. She asked me what I had. Seemed confused at half the things I told her. Told me she had never heard my conditions being refused paracetamol. Told me she didn’t know me, know if headaches were my normal. Said again that my head injury wasn’t impressive and that I should go back.
I just… I cried. I cried more and then I cried some more. It was 4am on the 4th of December and I was crying because what else could I do apart from that.
The reassurance used as treatment by the paramedics was clearly not helping.
***
Recently, I had a flare up, bad enough to call the paramedics. As a chronically ill person, I would willing be tortured, brutally, than go to a hospital.
When I call the paramedics, it is not for a walk in the park. It is because, my body that has so much wrong with it, that is in constant pain that I have to live with, work with, laugh with, something is wrong with it. Something that I cannot sincerely tolerate. Something that is scaring me more than I already am scared of.
I do not go to seek medical attention because I am bored or need a kick out of existence. I go there because I am in pain I cannot tolerate anymore.
Also, to every medical professional who has judged me when I have told them that I do not take any medication. I do not take it because the last time I took medication, I suffered from side effects, horrible side effects. When we called the doctor, they didn’t know that these medications had those side effects that are mentioned in every website that sells this medication. They had the audacity to be surprised.
No doctor has ever sat with me and worked on giving me medication that works with my body. None. Ergo, I don’t take any because (even doctors who have had exactly three classes about Achalasia Cardia) assume that Achalasia Cardia is curable by surgery. The pain and all. It isn’t. I live with it. Every day, of my life, in pain. They don’t give me medications that work for me because I am supposed to be cured in their mind. I live in pain.
A system built on ableism, sexism and racism, we assume it to have lost its heavy tinting of prejudice. Then we ask, why do disabled people, people of colour and everyone in between not trust medical professionals. Ironic.
