Doctor, Doctor

Doctor, Doctor

One Trick Pony, Show Dog, Performing Ape.
Don’t I deserve a treat for all the hoops
you’ve made me jump through? I’m always showered,
hair styled, polite smile, make-up on just so.
Presentable. Just to be presented
with another reason as to why choice
is a privilege, and non-autonomous
in my standing. Why it is best for me
to mess with my hormones in another
way: Depo-Povera, pill, Implanon,
pill, IUD, pill, pill, pill. Stop bleeding.
Don’t you know women are built to feel pain,
you’ve had it your whole life, what’s a little
more. Age, Purpose, Age, Purpose, CHANGE YOUR MIND.
You call my world an oyster by virtue that
you quaff aphrodisiacs in my pain,
and find pearls in the gritting of my teeth.
When is graduation from all these tests?
Hand me my cap and gown, call for the wel-
come stretcher, spotlight my monodrama,
I am closer to grabbing a scalpel
and ripping out this dumb hollow organ
than conceding to another person
the ability to coerce themselves
into it. I cannot hear more sorrys
filled with empty words and fake assurance–

Here’s your insurance, your Medicare with
rebate, fifty-dollars off two-hundred,
how nice, have a nice day, please come again.

Notes

Notes

Below are some notes about this piece, including the thoughts and external inspirations that occurred during its creation. 
Bear in mind, this is simply what I was thinking of when I wrote these poems and what they mean to me. If you interpreted them differently, that does not diminish how you felt as the reader nor the correctness/incorrectness of what you were thinking. 
Doctor, Doctor [2024] is a monologue I wrote after a particularly frustrating gynaecology appointment. I had been denied tubal ligation and endometrial ablation after six months of appointments and consistently being referred for temporary treatments that use the same hormones that lead me to wanting those permanent procedures. It is set in my point of view with inserts of dialogue from doctors and switches to the POV of a medical admin at the end. In a 2023 survey, ‘70% of women experienced bias’ and discrimination in medical settings. This ranges from having symptoms and requests being dismissed to medication and surgeries being outright denied unless a set of boxes were ticked; said boxes often needing permission from a psychologist, a parent, or a partner, as if women are incapable of making their own decisions. With each set of bloods, each GP visit, each reiteration of my medical history and reminder of my youth with regret being pushed onto me by people who will never bother understanding who I am, my mental stability steadily declines. Long live the medical non-system. 
monologue

Sources: 

NWHAC
Duke Health

Below are some notes about this piece, including the thoughts and external inspirations that occurred during its creation.
Bear in mind, this is simply what I was thinking of when I wrote these poems and what they mean to me. If you interpreted them differently, that does not diminish how you felt as the reader nor the correctness/incorrectness of what you were thinking. Poetry is subjective, and so is being alive.