What hope do we have..?

[FalseStartered]

If the nurse practitioner at my GP surgery can't use the word 'vagina'?

I've just been to check up on a few things, i'm 45, having more hot flushes than ever before, getting spots etc and after a bout of thrush, was putting 2 & 2 together...

she handed me a swab and said you can do that yourself, it goes quite far in there

i said 'oh right into my vagina then' and she flushed and nodded 'yes, that's it'

this was in a consulting room, with a solid door and no adjoining rooms, wtf is a nurse doing there who can't use the word vagina

anyway, glad to get that off my chest

You said "chest"! That's, like, close to saying "boobies"...

Best to say "front" instead. Or gesture vaguely and cough.

That's bizarre.

I wonder what she'd have done if you'd just looked all deliberately blank and said "In where?"

bloody ridiculous isn't it?

not the first time it's happened there either, GP used a similar 'thing' a while back, but as it was in front of DD i thought he was being twee on her account.

i almost said 'what, up my cunt'

She wanted you to tamper with your own unmentionables?

what is the world coming to?

what, up my cunt?

Wish you did say that.

i didn't mind having to do it myself, it is my vagina after all

i'm kicking myself that i didn't Cookie

i'm going to use 'cunt' when i go back in 2 weeks

do and take a picture (of her face not your wottsit? oh yeah Vagina)

I remember before having an operation being handed two very large torpedo shaped objects to stick somewhere else.

The person who handed them over had no trouble at all expressing where exactly they were to go

Deffo you need to sneak a cunt into convo with this woman.
You should have acted dumb that would have been so funny.

yeah SQ

"are you joking? If I stick it too far in it will touch my brain "

oops, "too far into my ear it will touch my brain"

@ correction

That would be a very long way to stick it!

maybe i should go back to the docs with an ear ache, and tell them i got confused

Oh, FFS... Quite a lot of patients probably do get all if the poor nurse refers to their vaginas/fannies/cunts/muffs/fanjos/etc...
She's probably learnt from bitter experience to follow Ronan Keating's advice and say fuck all.

I have a female relation MIL who refers to peacocks as "pearoosters" lest she have to use the word "cock"

How this woman has been married for 40 years, birthed and raised 3 sons is beyond me!

That's hilarious NC

Childish I kinow but I'd have to ask her in passing some time regularly what those things are that the badminton players fire about. Or that thing in the toilet cistern "think something's wrong with the flush or that thing MIL, what's it called?"

Kinow?

know

Cookie I think we may have needed to find her smelling salts if I asked that

This is pretty bad. But not surprising. I've been seeing a gynaecologist (sp?) recently and he was also unable to say the word vagina. He seriously called it my 'bottom'. I wanted to ask him whether he even went to medical school if he can't tell the difference. I didn't. I just left and have found a new doctor to see.

Utterly depressing.

BlameIt - surely that gynae's coyness could have had some serious and unpleasant effects. Are you sure he didn't say 'front bottom'?

I think mango's right ... she's probably not bothered but knows some people will be.

It'd be nicer if she could just say the word in a matter-of-fact way, obviously, but I wouldn't imagine she was really embarrassed.

I do see why it's an issue, but I think sometimes there's a place for using euphemisms if your patient really is uncomfortable. I remember a nurse coming to see my gran when she was ill, and she'd had some continence problems but really could never admit it, and when the nurse pressed her to say what was wrong she said it was 'down there'. The nurse kept insisting 'is it your legs, love, or your bum? I can't help if I don't know if it's your bum', and gran kept getting more and more flustered and saying 'down there'.

I wish that nurse had been able/willing to bring herself to use a euphemism!

I would imagine some women would be embarrassed and a nurse can't do all the campaigning in the world, she has to look after people too, I'd say?

I don't want a nurse to use a euphemism though, i want a nurse to use the correct terminology, and after i'd said 'vagina' she still couldn't bring herself to say it too.

It's not campaigning if you're in the medical profession though, is it?

maybe i'm more rad than i thought...

I think a good nurse should be able to adapt to her patients.

I would say that - instead of blaming the individual doing a job often done by women, often not well respected by the patriarchy - we should blame society that makes some women embarrassed to hear or use these names for their body parts.

I think that's radical feminism - to me.

I totally agree, not being able to cope with body parts and their names is the actions of children/teenagers.. and should not be the actions of adults.

i'm not blaming or calling her though, i have said up thread it happened with a GP a wee while back, or at least i didn't think i was

i have toyed with the idea of contacting the practice manager (who incidently is a woman) and asking why staff can't use correct terms