102 Becoming a Patient
are inherently more subjective, and less quantifiable, than medical con-
ditions diagnosed through laboratory findings. Suzanne, the psychiatrist on
lithium, observed:
Even psychiatric residents have problems when they talk to pa-
tients: ‘‘Why don’t you take your medicine?’’ As if it’s easy taking
seventeen pills a day! A delusional and paranoid person living on
his or her own, trying to make it, not working, is not going to take
six of one pill in the morning, four of another in the afternoon, and
five of another at night. They’re not going to remember.
Sadly and revealingly, shame and fears of stigma and discrimination
led many physicians to hide their own psychiatric symptoms. Frank, the
surgeon who had an MI in the OR, for example, saw other ill physicians
he had treated as terrified, and embarrassed by their fear. ‘‘They’re just
like regular patients—frightened to death and superafraid. But they put
on a show of nonchalance.’’
Losses of Dignity and Identity
Ill physicians heightened their sensitivity, too, to the indignities and
losses of sense of self that patients endure. Patienthood radically altered
outward appearances and self-images.
As suggested earlier, sick doctors literally found themselves clothed
differently—forced to undress and to wear only flimsy patient gowns or lie
naked—in ways that carried both real and symbolic import, signifying
dramatic loss of power. For Brian, who had hepatitis, having to disrobe for
his doctor marked the defining moment of his change in institutional
status.
To get undressed for the biopsy, and put on this paper gown—I’m
exposed, not in my regular clothes. Even though they give me a
gown, I feel impersonal exposure. It was awkward, knowing that
people walk in and out of the room.
As mentioned earlier, many physicians resisted wearing such patient
robes.
Deeper senses of loss of individuality and self ensued. The disappear-
ance of hair due to chemotherapy disturbed many profoundly. For Nancy,
loss of her hair robbed her of a significant part of her self and her identity.