Was I U to tell a doctor she’ll understand when she’s a mum?

She shouldn't have said that, and you shouldn't have said what you did.

Part of being a doctor is dealing with people, not just their ailments and injuries. Even though she was off duty, she should have been more professional.

You were rude in your response, which isn't something to evsr say to a woman. But I can see why you met her comment with yours.

How is the child?

To thos sayjng she may not want kids or become a parent I totally agree however working in healthcare you do learn more compassion over time and get your edges knocked off through experience. The arrogance that newly qualified doctors often start out with goes over time as well because they learn the limitations of their role and that tends to change their perspective too. It's not just having kids that changes perspective. However much you think you understand being a parent though you really don't until you are one and I say that as someone who had my kids in my late 30s so I've plenty of life experience on the other side of it, being told I didn't understand and being sure I did.

I don't mean this in a 'you don't understand love until you've had a child's way, we love plenty in our lives without children, it's the worry. I've never known anything else like the worry for a sick child and I've worried over many things and lost many family members and been in many horrible situations but none compare to being in a life threatening situation for my child. The level of fear I can't imagine relating to anything else. And I watched my mum with and die from a horrible illness on her 50s so I've known deathbeds and hospitalisations before kids.

However she also needs to learn not to declare that to a parent dealing with an injured child in the moment, even if that parent is her friend

The level of arrogance towards parents is so ethinh I didn't understand until I was a parent, I'm sure I was an a hole hundreds of times unwittingly (not a doctor but a clinician) she sounds embarrassingly stupid. I've had kids in hospital for serious conditions over the years, eldest had recurrent seizures and was resuscitated several times and honestly the things I've encountered. What an idiot she sounds. She'll learn but it'll take time.

Sometimes you do just need to take a breath and realise they don't get it and that's their issue not yours.

There was no need for the doctor to make that kind of comment and it's hard to understand why she did, except as some kind of expression of "superiority", quite abrasive in this context where empathy would be more appropriate.

I understand what she means when you see some parents carry on.

Thank you!! I wish more parents would understand that that's not a life goal for a lot of women.

Sorry OP I think YABU here. You basically implied that she won’t be good at her job unless her becomes a mother.

Also I think you’re conflating two different situations and the skills required to deal with them. This was an acute medical situation. Those require Drs, nurses, paramedics etc to use quick thinking, assess the patient on brief or no medical history and remain calm during the commotion. And yes a lot of the time that involves ignoring screaming children and hysterical parents in order to get to the crux of situation and prevent it escalating.

Dealing with medical issues that affect long term health are a very different process. There is no imminent medical emergency. You have more time to get to know your patent, their history, behaviour patterns in order to decide which course of treatment is best or having the best impact

I think that's nonsense. There is this little thing called empathy which enables others to understand why other people might react as they do without necessarily living their exact experience.

I am a parent, but there is no great mystery that was revealed to me when I became a parent, and I was perfectly capable of understanding and empathising with parents before I had my own dc.

And in any case, not all parents would react to the same situation in the same way anyway.

She does need to be immune to the distress of children and their parents. She needs to focus on being a professional, assessing the facts of the situation, and getting the child the help it needs. To do this, emotions have to a take a back seat, way way back.You'll understand this if you ever become a doctor.

Same... The parents who let their 4 year old out to ride a bike without being anywhere nearby is the thing that stood out for me more than anything else! And it took a while for the mother to be found? That's far worse than a doctor who may or may not have said something insensitive... I think you're focusing on the wrong thing.

If she has graduated with a degree in medicine, then she is already a doctor.

So you are saying the only doctors who should treat injured children should be parents themselves?

I’m not a mother and I do think there are feelings and emotions non parents can’t understand. But this woman is not there in a capacity as a parent, rather a doctor, so surely it’s a moot point? You want her to be detached.

my friends who are doctors have said it's totally different with one's own child and one is every bit as much a nervous parent as the non-doctor parents.

Good for you. You're not allowed to make obviously true statements that might offend childless women on this site wihout people getting weird about it, but you're right of course.

She cannot hope to understand why parents react as they do because she's not a parent. It's not complex, and since she made the shitty comment having a dig at people for having normal and perfectly understandable feelings FIRST you had every right to put her back in her box.

However, there's nothing to be gained from you bringing it up again, and you will only push her further into her uncaring bubble if you do. Glad you said something, but now just leave it.

Absolutely. As someone who now works in healthcare I always listen to the patents

when the parents say to me I’m worried this isn’t normal….we can just tell

i always trust a mothers instinct.

Not so calm on deck then.

Months adding up to years long experience of kids hospital. Majority attending are anxious parents, some are hysterical at times / suffering from mental ill health.

Studies show 30% of kids shouldn’t get to A&E ….” up to 30% of children access the Pediatric Accident and Emergency Department (A&E) for non-urgent health care that should normally follow other health care paths.” https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1755599X21000914

So she’s right - in a lot of cases she needs to discount the parents decision making.

Where a child has childhood cancer - 0.2% of kids - yes during assessment and treatment parents are likely to be more attuned to their child’s needs and behaviour. So in very ill kids parents views need to be heard and reacted to.

Her job is to ignore the heightened stress response in parents & assess risk & medical need. Good for her. She’ll be better at it than most people who have had a child. Breeding isn’t a cure all.

Seriously, you behaved like a total asshole and now you want to double down by criticising her unreasonably further?

What you should do if you see her again is apologise, and if you don't see her again ask your neighbour to pass on your apologies. You're lucky she is able to ignore overly anxious adults and ignore your rude behaviour in the moment, it obviously would not have helped the situation if she'd got upset and responded to you the way you deserved.

It sounds like she was boasting about being calm under pressure/immune to the noise, which I can see might be annoying of her, but it's not your place to tell her that she's wrong to tune out the chaos and focus on her job—or that she'll be somehow 'better' if she ever becomes a mother.

Just let this go. What she said has nothing to do with you, really. If she truly does need to be more sensitive, she'll probably learn that in time, but definitely don't bring it up again.

Primary caregivers, whether parent, spouse, or a full-time nanny etc, always have the best understanding of a person's day-to-day baseline. Because they are always present. They catch sudden changes much faster than a doctor could as a result and so are utilised in these things.

But there are downsides as well, which they wouldn’t have been focussed on during this terrible time for you obviously. Constant exposure also causes 'change blindness,' where slow, gradual symptoms go unnoticed but are actually instantly obvious to someone who only visits occasionally or rarely sees the child/person. And deep emotional attachment can sometimes cloud whatever caregiver in questions objective judgement is, on any given situation.

She was stupid to say that in this context.
You may have overstepped a little.
But what was said, was said. I'd leave it alone.

If you do see her again I would follow up with her if it was me and say you're sorry if your comment came across as rude, but you think it's really important doctors understand the emotions involved in your child being hurt and are able to feed your knowledge and experience of your child into their medical approach, whilst maintaining a necessary clinical detachment. I do think for your emotional well-being as a medical professional you need to be able to maintain a level of detachment, but equally people who are emotionally burnt out and so detached they lose empathy and insight is a real problem. A dying friend was treated very cruelly by a nurse who refused to call the on call doctor to administer pain medication despite her being in agony, due to a clear lack of empathy. that is just horrifying and should never happen. So I do think it is worth following up in case she's just a bit clueless rather than actively lacking in empathy.

A doctor should be calm without being patronising. She was patronising and got a patronising response.

If someone has an injury, the first thing is to keep calm and assess the situation!
Your comment wasride and patronising.