My Doctor Face

It was my third miscarriage. I knew what was happening. I had seen my obstetrician. I was fully booked for the next two weeks.

I thought about cancelling my patients, but then looked through my patient list for the day. A young patient who had had a stillbirth and wanted to go through the postmortem report with me. Three patients booked for pregnancy consults. A patient who I had recently broken the news of a brain tumour to.

I swallowed my tears and put on my doctor face.

I remember at one point feeling a ‘rush’ of something. I went to the toilet and saw I had passed the ‘products’. I cleaned myself up, took some more painkillers and called the next patient in.

I was met with “No one told me you were running late”, “I have another appointment to get to” and “I’m so sick of waiting at doctors when you’re busy drinking tea.”

I nearly burst into tears. I wanted to scream that they had no idea I was at work having a miscarriage, and the reason I was running late was because I’d just had to flush my much wanted pregnancy down the toilet.

Thankfully, those years of communication skills and training kicked in and I calmly replied, “I’m so sorry you feel that way. What can I do for you today?”