Why explain the one procedure but not the other? I hadn’t heard of either before.
A pilonidal cyst is something that people get from spending a prolonged time in a sitting position while rarely laying down straight or standing all the way. It became known during American wars of teh 20th century when service members (generally men at the time) spent hours or days sitting upright in jeeps. However, it is not in any way specific to men. Pores at the bending point, right at the base of the spine/top if the butt stay elongated, and can get clogged. Then there is basically open space behind there where an abscess can build from what is pretty much just a clogged pore. For some reason this is being portrayed as a sexist thing.
This cyst doesn’t have to be specifically male to make the sexism point. But the point would be best made if the procedures were the same or in some way obviously equivalent and the only difference was the gender of the patients. Either way it’s a comic so you have to trust the author that there’s a real basis or you need personal experience of the phenomenon. Which a lot women have. 1
- Because they’re crazy2
- JK LOL
It’s not a procedure, just a fancy adjective for cysts to mean “in the butt crack, tailbone area”.
They could have just said “cyst removal” but I feel there is a bit of cheeky meaning to the fact that it’s specifically about a sore butt; alluding to “men get all the pain meds just for being butt hurt while women struggle to be taken seriously”
I’m also confused why the term wasn’t explained.
I can’t put into words how horribly sexist doctors can be. Oddly enough (in my experience) especially when it comes to ob/gyn stuff. I have had to threaten legal action before. It can be a hellscape.
i know a woman who has early onset arthritis. She was in so much pain that she begged for death. She’s also allergic to almost all NSAIDs. Her GP told her to lose weight (She wasn’t overweight, and was actually very fit. She ran 4 times a week and was very active) and prescribed her motrin. she took it, not knowing it was an nsaid, trusting her doctor (who knew about her allergy). she had to be rushed to the ER for the allergic reaction.
When she finally got an appointment with a rheumatologist, they took one look at her and decided that she’s faking it (again, because she’s not elderly), and sent her away because they assumed she was drug seeking. a few days later she went to the ER for intense pain, the ER doctor referred her to the same rheumatologist and actually did give her tramadol for the pain. The pain killers didn’t help with the pain. She went back to the rheumatologist after having to wait on the waiting list again. they again tried to prescribe NSAID pain killers, instead of actually starting the treatment for arthritis.
Only after several more months of this did they start her with the actual treatment for the disease. It took a long time to find medicine which actually helped, because the normal medicine for this didn’t work for her. I think it took them a year to actually find the medicine which actually helped.
Multiply it by a thousand if you’re overweight…
Honestly, most are at least slightly overweight in the US. I’ve never been obese, but many times have I had a sexists fucking “doctor” observe me and with a head nod say I need to lose 20 lbs.
I’m kind of marveling at the fact that the area in around the vagina is considered the vestibule of a woman.
Like, vestibule for who exactly?
It is a vestibule, not the vestibule. The word in this context just means “a bodily cavity that serves as an entrance to another cavity” basically. The inner ear is also a vestibule. The area between your lips and gums is another. There are quite a few more as well.
I do appreciate the excellent scientific explanation of the term. I was just making a stupid joke. 😅
for the guests
You can spruce up the entryway even if you aren’t expecting a party.
After I had lower surgery they were tightly controlling the pain meds. Basically giving me minimum possible doses and not allowing anything else. Even the day after when the bolster was pulling a stitch and I was in screaming pain for hours so bad I also got an asthma attack then they confiscated my inhaler until they could clear it with the doctor. Y’all ever have coughing fits the day after getting five abdominal incisions? Fun times fun times
I had a pilonidal cyst removed and got absolutely jack shit. Nothing. The hospital was paranoid about opiate seekers and treated me like total scum.
Yep they are so paranoid that you can’t even get care. It’s wild
They wouldn’t even give me single pill after my car was flipped on the interstate. I could barely walk
Got one removed too. Got prescribed parecetamol and tramadol (I think, that was years ago)…
Learned that way that opioids has barely any effect on me. And that I barely felt a thing despite the healing process (don’t search for it on the net, it can be quite graphic).
I also learned I have quite the healing factor. Not the Wolverine level, but enough to heal faster than most people. Downside of it is that I scar really easily 😅.
Sounds like a sexist doctor because most of my doctors wouldn’t prescribe anything other than over the counter ibuprofen even when I was in the worst pain in my life. My mother on the other hand would walk out with a sack of pain killers.
Sounds like she had a decent doctor. Women frequently receive less pain relief and often have their pain downplayed by medical professionals.
You’d think it would go the other way, since the (incorrect) stereotype is that men can handle pain better.
That’s WHY it happens though. “If he’s complaining he must really be in pain!” vs “she’s just whining, women are wimps”.
The other (usually correct) stereotype is that a lot of doctors have this weird, paternalistic “I know better and they’re just whining” mentality when the patient is a woman. My mother and sister both have loads of chronic health issues and finding doctors that wouldn’t dismiss the issues (especially invisible ones like fibromyalgia) and actually listened to them when they listed all the things they’ve already tried was a nightmare.
Meanwhile my brother-in-law has a mystery illness that causes chronic gut pain but every test shows something different, yet he’s easily able to get his doctors to try specific tests and treatments for whatever the latest theory is despite years of no success.
Ah, when coming from the “don’t worry your pretty little head, missy” angle, it makes sense.
Actually The stereotype is quite the opposite. Because of the fact that women go through childbirth, a lot of doctors, a lot of people generally think women handle pain more easily than men.
I started elecyrolysis on my face a while ago and my electrologist said that cis men are the biggest babies about the pain. Me laying there getting two hours of electro on my face every week and dudes tapping out after two or three hairs lol.
My theory is that people who have had to deal with neither menstrual cramps (let alone childbirth) nor the various trials of gender affirming treatments are a lot less likely to have had extensive periods of just having to deal with pain for a long time. Like, maybe they’ve had some injuries, or other brief episodes, but unless they have some other condition like chronic migraines, I think a lot of able-bodied cis men haven’t had to regularly sit with pain and just deal with it.
It’s understandable that this would happen, but extremely frustrating when somehow that becomes the default cultural view and condescending cis men in positions of power get to smugly decide that they’re manly men with great pain tolerance and anyone who complains about pain is surely just being a baby/whiny hysterical woman.
(There is also absolutely a racialized component here where Black and brown folks tend to receive fewer painkillers, which this doesn’t really account for, but this is not meant to be a comprehensive explanation of disparities in pain management in health care, just my theorizing why cis men on average seem to have lower rates of pain tolerance.)
I had a TENs machine. I also have endometriosis (after suffering for over 20 years found a surgeon willing to do surgery, gods bless her for giving me a chance to live). When I was still with my ex I used it as a simulator to try to show him what my pain felt like. He was on the floor screaming and couldn’t straighten his legs or stand up because of the pain and I was just standing there chilling and hadn’t even hit the lowest threshold of my normal everyday pain limit, let alone the pain I felt when I had my period. I was like now do you understand why I’m exhausted and depressed all the time and hate my life?
Yeah, that tracks.
There is a portion of the population for whom fairly intense pain is not a “when that happened to me” but a “when that happens to me” and it just really results in developing a pain tolerance skill that I don’t think those for whom pain is understood as the occasional discrete injury really get. There are conditions that can cause that to happen to cis men, but it’s less common than for, uh, the entire rest of the population, and so fewer of them have had to develop that skill.
(Also, really glad you were finally able to get the surgery to help!)
I see that come up a lot with tattoo artists. Apparently their clients who are men tend to struggle with the pain of it and on the flip side the women tend to be more tolerant.
I know I’ve fallen asleep during certain tattoos, and while I did have one hurt quite a lot (in a well known place for pain) I just remember thinking oh wow this one is a doozy but I didn’t do anything outwardly about it.
My husband on the other hand straight up passes out from the pain. He didn’t believe me when I said I fell asleep for some of my tattoos so on my next tattoo I wore a heart rate monitor and he was in disbelief when I averaged about 50bpm through the whole thing.
There could also be selection effects at work, with regard to who gets tattoos and for what reason.
I knew a woman who had fibromyalgia and she used to get tattoos all the time. She said the tattoos helped with her fibro pain. Pain is weird, that’s all I can say about that!
Woo! Sensory overload! Intense, direct pain in a localized area helps to drown out widespread, decentralized pain.
Basically, one can focus on that one pain and prevent the brain from processing the fact that other parts of the body are also sending signals of pain, allowing one the illusion of momentary relief of that pain.
Also known as “diffuse noxious inhibitory control” or “conditioned pain modulation”.
The human brain is just a meat computer and it can be hacked.
When my wife got her first tattoo, the artist remarked that she was very still the whole time. I haven’t gotten one because I know better.
As a cis man, can confirm, we’re whiny little babies about pain.
Sounds like a sexist doctor
Yeah it’s supposed to, that’s the point
I hear this, but overall their has been a medical scare on the overuse of painkillers in general. So I think it’s more what type of doctor you have than “who you are”.
I (male) had shingles during COVID lockdown and was only allowed 2 strong painkiller capsules. I asked for more and was told essentially to just try and ignore it and take common over the counter painkillers. They did absolutely nothing and the doctor knew they did nothing.
I recall sitting in agony a lot not able to do anything else because the pain was so intense. Just sweating and wincing, trying to not think about it. Last time I used that doctor for anything.
Meanwhile my parents had a literal shoebox filled to the top with fentanyl patches left over after surgeries they both had because their doctor was just throwing them at them. They had serious pain, but their doctor just didn’t give a fuck and would throw things anytime they asked. Probably because he thought they were going to die soon anyway.
There have been multiple studies about how painkillers are underperscribed to women. There’s been a huge push to get doctors to recognize women’s pain, as well as surveys done on doctors with patients facing similar problems who will, in general, under report pain in women. It is a systemic problem.
I knew a veteran with a terminal disease and the VA would just ship them quart jugs of oral morphine. It’s pearly green just like the stories
I feel like I need a degree to fully appreciate this strip, but I also feel like you could interpret this in any direction. Like, does the doctor care more about the woman or less? Is the male patient more whiney or did the doc have more empathy with him? Getting more and stronger painkillers is not necessarily a good thing and I have no idea about any of the conditions and how painful they are
the main issue is that women pain and issues are generally not taken as seriously as men’s. it’s a documented issue. and it is not just pain. quite often serious issues get ignored by doctors because the patient was in her period and that explains it, and end up with serious complications.
I have read far too many articles about women being ignored when they complain of abdominal pain, only to come back later and find out it was cancer the whole fucking time.
It makes me sick. I don’t distrust the science of medicine. I distrust the practitioners of medicine.
just came from a bookclub (ended at 3am). but one black woman there was telling us about her pregnancy, where they forced C-section her without her consent, and how nurses came in and shoved their hands in places without asking or responding to her when she said they were hurting her. and how she was invited to a an event to tell her horror story, which ended in a standing applause… gor the gynecology team…
it’s really bad
They care more because the woman only had a vestibularectopicectomy* while the man has a parental cyst removed. Whatever the fuck those are.
Why wouldn’t they have the same procedure done?
Why do I need a medical degree to understand a comic?
Right? we need the follow up strip where the dude is now addicted to opioids and is pan handling for “gas money” lol.
Does the woman getting the pilonidial cyst also get the same pain medication?
That’s what the comic tried to miserably demonstrate: no.
Oh it’s not just the US. Gender discrimination in medicine is pretty global, even down to the research level largely being studied on men.
Do you have any sources on that? Sounds kind of far fetched. If this is a world wide phenomenon then maybe because it’s culturally independent? Maybe there’s a biological or medicinal reason for not treating men and women alike? Everyone should be treated individually because of their needs, all comparing is harmful.
And it’s a veeery sensitive topic, judging other people’s pains, especially nowadays where every female-male-topic is ideologically laden, with lots of prejudices, claims and vigour, even hate and misogynie. We can agree on “let’s look at how pain and other medical treatment should depend on a person’s sex”.
Everyone demanding “I should get that too because men get that” should then allow me to stay in childbed (or maternity leave) because my wife gave birth.
The dangerous dismissal of women’s pain From misdiagnosis to medical bias: Why women are living longer but not better
Sex Inequalities in Medical Research: A Systematic Scoping Review of the Literature
This is a well documented phenomenon, meanwhile you seem extremely disingenuous and misogynistic with your flippant commentary about staying in your wife’s hospital bed after she goes through childbirth.
Looking at your tone you seem quite angry and maybe not open for discussion? You reference some sources for this “well documented phenomenon” that make me wonder if you read that or just asked some AI for it?
I agree with you if you want some more research done about specific disparities. It seems especially women in their 50s are underrepresented in medical research. There’s more of course, but it’s not “you are a woman, you don’t get any treatment”. This is as wrong as denying biological differences between the sexes.
I mean, yeah, fair point. Taken.
What’s more, female doctors can also perpetuate discrimination.
Not really, it’s an extension of the point. The medical industry has such a pervasive issue with sexism against women that even women doctors are conditioned to perpetuate it because that is the medical culture they have been trained on.
It’s an understanding that the issue isn’t just male doctors but the entire culture of medical practice being influenced by patriarchal society that even female doctors begin to not take women’s healthcare seriously because they have been conditioned by current, male-dominated medical science and practice.
Whataboutism: what are you doing to rectify this?
*In Israel.
I guess if your country isn’t actively genociding an entire people this study is not valid as the patriarchy is still under control…
What are they, Dutch doctors? Prescribing Panadol…
It’s Tranadol which is one of the brand names for Tramadol which is a low level opioid painkiller.
Paracetamol is known as Panadol in Australia.
I’m used to Panadol as a typical over the counter headache medicine.
Sounds like the average Australian doctor to me
PROTIP: If you know it’s coming up ahead of time, then order your own painkillers off the dark web.
Your doctor isn’t trying to offer the best service. They’re avoiding liability in a situation where they’re already getting paid, and senseless misery isn’t considered “harm”.
I’d ask up front if they’d be willing to prescribe medication if I didn’t expect them to write “drug seeking” in their secret libel notes.
This is only really a protip if you’re already well familiar with navigating the dark web and have a network of sources you personally know to be trustworthy. Even then there are inherent risks but unfortunately it is either taking those risks or suffering from the pain because of social barriers to accessing safe medications.
Uhh taking medication you’re not supposed to during a medical appointment is a fast track to being 6 feet under
You don’t know what you’re actually getting, you don’t know if it has any complications with your surgery, and you don’t know if they’ll provide some medication that does not go with what you took.
You can easily get a different drug or even get one that’s contaminated, you could accidentally take a drug with a side effect of dilating your blood vessel or anti blood clot and bleed out, or you could take a drug that doesn’t work with anesthesia and you wake up by accident during the procedure
Please be safe and if you don’t think your doctors are providing care, find a second opinion.
Sorry if I was unclear, I meant for after the procedure!
How would you ask the first opinion without getting the drug seeking note?
Ah that makes sense
I can’t stop you from doing it, but please make sure you do your due diligence on where you get it from and exactly how it will affect you
As for doctors, it’s a very much your mileage may vary type of scenario. They’ll have their own biases as evident by the comic. You can ask them about the procedure though, and you can frame it as how it’ll affect you. Ask them about how post procedure will look like. You can subtly nudge them by saying you didn’t have a good reaction with x prescription previously, and how it affected your daily life. They should be able to get an alternative placed for you.
Alright, so I’ve actually ordered drugs off whitehouse on the darkweb when it was still active and I’m 90% sure it was meth. Learn from my mistakes, there is almost no accountability and meth is very cheap to make.
Interesting.
I wasn’t expecting this comic to bring out misogynists.I think they’re just downvoting because your edits are more confusing and distracting, not because of misogyny. Like, the OP didn’t get downvoted the same.
This, lmao, I downvoted the “edit” because it feels cluttered, hated the tiny memes (while I upvoted the main post).
OP just doesn’t want to realize people didn’t like their stuff.
Nope, they parallel both. But I did find your comment edits ITT quite hostile.
Ever read of comic styles?
Here, clean up the comic a tad, and added Link from LoZ📺(1989) to exemplify the Misogynistic tones, to make the points clearer, as folks had trouble reading the gender discrimination thesis of the comic.
Why? How was that supposed to help? It’s just exactly the same but more cluttered and confusing. Just worse.
I’ve spent way more time trying to figure out why there are random, meaningless icons of a video game character in the speech bubbles than it took me to read the comic in the first place.
EDIT I just noticed her forehead turned blue in one of the panels too, wtf, was this intentional?? This is fascinating
Oh what you didn’t like the 👄 emoji inserted into the comic?
Surely that adds context
What about the shrug emoji?
helps folks that are hard of seeing contextualize parts. Visual aids sort of speak.
Notice I colored the important parts of the Doctor’s hypocritical prescriptions.The color makes the text harder to read, imo
I don’t disagree. Had to consult a praxis chat, and they were able to inform me my edit makes the comic less monochromacally, protanomaly, and tritanomaly legible.
Someone can if they want, make it more monochromacally legible, while highlighting the key words using a different font.
Currently busy.
Much better, thanks.
I’m more perplexed at how this comic triggered misogynists. Like, tune out if you didn’t like the comic. why “unworth read” this?
I have a strong feeling you used AI
Ok fine, I still don’t get why you did it tho.
to exemplify the Misogynistic tones, to make the points clearer, as folks had trouble reading the gender discrimination thesis of the comic
AI edits would probably have made more sense contextually but have malformed details
That you can’t tell is the entire point of AI. For the moment, most of us still can, but that is changing.
