Today, I am here at the hospital with my pregnant wife waiting for our turn to meet our obstetrician. We have generally had a great experience; our doctor does not ignore me and only talk to my wife like every other doctor. They acknowledge my presence, her lesbian partner’s presence, and have me involved every step of the way. The midwife who gave us a tour the other day did not even once mention a father. It was all about how the other parent could sit here and get coffee there.

Oh, I apologize – I forgot to mention ‘I wish’. I wish our doctor did not ignore me while treating my wife. I wish I could be more involved in the healthcare of my wife and my future child. I wish the midwife did not emphasize the father of the child so much. But hey, what better can I expect from this system [Dean et al]?

I remember when a doctor refused to get anywhere near me during a breast exam, although I think I have had it better than most of my other friends. One trans friend of mine had healthcare staff laughing at him because of his appearance. Another one of my trans friends had a doctor who refused to address her by her feminine pronouns.

I have heard them say that they have had it much better than their Intersex friends, who are usually forced into “normalizing” their genitalia unless they want male genitalia, in which case they are very heavily advised against and instead told to get female genitalia. I am pretty sure that they would say that at least they are treated better than their asexual friends. I would never be able to handle that. Not that I can handle what I am going through right now. If it were up to me, I would never visit a doctor another day in my life.

Unfortunately, life never works the way you want it to and here I am in the hospital, waiting for our turn. I do not know why I am surprised though. I should not expect anything from our healthcare system and its providers. Can I blame them? It took me a while to grow out of the bias I had internalized. Does that mean I am willing to give them a free pass? I am not sure.   

I know that they undergo diversity training, although I am not entirely positive it helps with anything. It definitely does not help that my healthcare is subsumed under women’s healthcare, which focuses on heterosexual reproduction. It still escapes me why I need to do a pap smear every time I need birth control [Dean et al].

It definitely does not help that the healthcare of my transgender friends’ is subsumed under LGB healthcare. We do not even acknowledge Intersex and Asexual people, much less the rest of the people on the spectrum. It is funny how most bioethics courses do not even speak of LGBTQ healthcare and even if they did, they only speak of AIDS in homosexual men.

Oh, you want us to be grateful that, at least, the discrimination is not as bad as it was before. I mean, I am not on conversion therapy; one less thing to complain about.  However, I cannot help but think about what my unborn child would go through when they walk in with their partner if they do not conform to the hetero-normative standards that were forced down my throat [Dean et al.]?

Ah, here I am, with my pregnant wife, waiting for our turn to meet the obstetrician. For the longest time, I let my doctors assume I was straight. Sure, it did lead to some interesting situations, and I barely got the right healthcare I needed, but at least I was not the weirdo who walked into their office. I am sure I was not the only one, and I certainly was not the last one. Hospital visits are stressful by themselves. 

You do not see the issue, do you? All you see is an attention seeker complaining about bad customer service at a hospital, don’t you? I do not blame you. Clearly, I am privileged enough to afford healthcare. There are so many others who cannot right?

There are so many people who cannot afford healthcare and guess who makes up a large part of that? Surprise, surprise! Us. Most of us do not even have health insurance. How would we, if we are kicked out of our houses the minute our parents found out about our identity? How would we, if we are unemployed because no one is willing to hire us? How would we, if we are homeless because no one would rent to us [Providing Inclusive Services..].

Why do the small number of us still fight to live then? Because we have hope that it will all get better in the future, but guess what, it never does. For one, there is discrimination within elderly housing and as we grow older, we are increasingly isolated. And then people wonder why we have high suicide rates. Oh, but what about therapy? Please do not get me started. Our doctors are not equipped enough to handle our physical health issues. We are less likely to even get preventative services for cancer, which honestly, I would assume is very apparent. 

You ask me for solutions now. Surely, you think it is fair to assume that if I see a problem, I should magically have solutions to fix it. Do I? I do not. Do I have suggestions? Maybe. I would start by changing the application forms to make them more inclusive. Perhaps, allowing us to write out our gender instead of choosing between male, female and others would normalize our identities and we would not feel othered. Perhaps changing the method of our diversity training would help. One brief session cannot undo years of acquired beliefs and practices. 

Now, does that mean that I want all clinicians to drop everything they are doing right now and fully live and breathe the lived experiences of my people, no. All I want for them is to engage with our lives, through our stories, through our media. But more than that, I want them to be able to recognize their own internal biases. Most of the microaggressions are unintentional and we know that. No matter how well-meaning a person is, we know that they grew up in a heteronormative society and we are mostly forgiving if they are genuinely apologetic for their behavior.

If they willing to take personal responsibility for their actions, we are willing to work with them. In fact, cis-gendered, heterosexual healthcare providers taking a personal responsibility for their actions destigmatizes our existence and inspires other people to also acknowledge us. Adding our narratives, talking about our issues instead of completely skipping our existence or just mentioning harmful facts about us at the medical education level would probably create a bigger impact. Bigger still would be research specific to our healthcare. Even better would be including us in our own healthcare [Dean et al].

I do not know when this will all change, or if it ever will. All I can do is hope for the best. Or I could boycott healthcare, become a skeptic, an anti-vaxxer and a flat-earther. Sometimes I wonder if they are all just people who had bitter hospital experiences. But, for now, I will wait with my pregnant wife, for our turn to meet our obstetrician.

References

[1] Dean, Megan A et al. “Inhospitable Healthcare Spaces: Why Diversity Training on LGBTQIA Issues Is Not Enough.” Journal of bioethical inquiry vol. 13,4 (2016): 557-570. doi:10.1007/s11673-016-9738-9       

[2] 2016, Published on 17 February. “Providing Inclusive Services and Care for LGBT People: A Guide for Health Care Staff ” LGBTQIA+ Health Education Center.” LGBTQIA+ Health Education Center, 26 May 2020, www.lgbthealtheducation.org/publication/learning-guide/. 

[3] Lauren B. McInroy & Shelley L. Craig (2017) Perspectives of LGBTQ emerging adults on the depiction and impact of LGBTQ media representation, Journal of Youth Studies, 20:1, 32-46, DOI: 10.1080/13676261.2016.1184243