Slow golf clap for the CDC.
Extra slow golf clap for the medical establishment that has been downgrading women’s pain for hundreds of years.
Dunce cap for every medical professional who has lied and said “it’s just a pinch” while they yield very sharp instruments at one of the most sensitive parts of a woman’s anatomy.
The renewed attention to pain medication for painful medical procedures has been refreshing to witness.
And a long time in coming.
No matter than women have been thought to be small men in regarding medical research. No matter that the often men ob-gyn probably didn’t have the parts in question and were in no way qualified to judge how uncomfortable a procedure could be.
The new CDC guidelines call for some sort of personalized pain relief for painful in-office procedures. Like a paracervical block. Or lidocaine jelly or spray to the area. This gives the women some measure of control of what is going to be a not-very-enjoyable experience.
You know, like the lidocaine jelly that we have been using for male urinary catheter insertion for years and years and years. Because urinary catheters hurt. (sad, clown face here)
Mind-blowing, I know.
Who do we have to thank for this?
The increase in the chatter around pain medication for painful procedures a woman might go through at the ob-gyn?
Social media.
And the girls and women who know that this is wrong and are speaking up about it.
Like many things, older generations of women would just put up with it because that is the way things are done.
I personally had a rather invasive procedure in an ob-gyn office that was painful. To give the doc credit he did offer a cervical block. But he knew and I knew that it would be the same kind of pain as the procedure and I told him to just go ahead.
But I had the option.
Choice.
It’s a beautiful thing.
Now that there is more attention to the woeful state of women’s pain control during procedures, I can only applaud, with fervor, all of those who have spoken up about it. And continue to speak up about it.
It’s time I spoke up too.
Not bad for a bunch of “hysterical” women.
Let’s reclaim that term next.
Dispatches from the Evening Shift 