 Today's video is sponsored by Squarespace. Dr. Patient Communication is something that I am very passionate about because as someone who's been a patient in our medical system of chronic pain and chronic illness for over a decade, I've been in way too many doctor's offices and way too many appointments where I felt like I wasn't heard at all. I felt like I couldn't get out what I wanted to say. I feel like my feelings or my symptoms were invalidated. I wasn't listened to. This was not the outcome that I was looking for and I'm like, how did I even get here and what can I do? Hello there, my beautiful, lovely internet friends. Welcome back to my channel. Thank you for joining me here today. Very important note as we start out. I have no idea who this is on my shirt. It was a $4 shirt at a thrift shop and I really hope it's someone nice. Our topic today is drum roll, please. How to have a productive, healthy and happy conversation with your doctor. Okay, I may have over promised. We're just gonna go for productive conversation. As someone who has been a patient in way too many doctor's offices, I'm very familiar with the frustration of feeling like you aren't being listened to as a patient and I also know from the doctor end of things, patient communication is something that can be really difficult to manage sometimes. What is happening? Over the years, I have collected a small basket of tools that have helped me improve my communication with doctors even when I'm very stressed or overwhelmed or in a difficult situation. And I've saved like the boilerplate ones for the end but I have some unorthodox methods that I would like to share with you as well and I would love to hear your thoughts at the end of this video. Tip number one, this is something that I've recently implemented in my medical vocabulary is how I actually start these doctor conversations. As the professional walks into the room, I used to always kind of wait for them to start things and follow along and answer yes, no questions and just kind of go with the flow. But I found that oftentimes that led to me being confused, overwhelmed, not actually ever getting my questions out, not finding that any of my goals or needs were met in that conversation by the time the doctor walked out and not even knowing what happened. So what I've started doing instead is kind of doing an intro to any conversation. Recently, I've had to see a lot of doctors for some complicated medical stuff. And instead of just letting them take control of the conversation and answer their questions, I've started off by saying, hey, it's really great to meet you. I appreciate you taking time with me today. What I'm looking for is someone who is willing to actually dive into what's going on and go beyond symptom treatment and management. I know that there's something larger at play here. I've had a difficult time finding that. Are you someone who is willing to look for this with me? Are you someone who is willing to go beyond just kind of treating symptoms and really dig into a deeper cause? Starting conversations that way, stating what my goals are and asking them if they are on board to be a part of that has really shifted the dynamic because it kind of takes things from this amalgamess of, okay, this doctor's coming in and now I'm just listening to them to taking ownership of that appointment for your health, stating what you're looking for and seeing if they're the person to be on board to do that. And maybe they aren't. However, if a doctor agrees to that, if they're like, yes, that is something that I would love to help you with, I found that that really sets the tone for the conversation moving forward. Tip number two, what I will often do is use I statements. We're taught a lot about these growing up, at least I was. Instead of pointing fingers and being like, you make me feel terrible, you're a jerk, changing the language to, I really feel like what you said was unkind and I didn't like our interaction then. Is this something we could talk about becomes a much healthier conversation because then you don't get the finger pointing back and forth. I think the same thing is true in communication with medical professionals. Using I statements if I feel like I'm not being heard or if maybe I feel disrespected or I'm unhappy with something has been really beneficial. So instead of saying, you aren't listening, you aren't hearing me, calling upon those difficult but good communication skills to instead say something like, I think I'm having difficulty conveying what I mean. Can we take a step back for just a second? Using communication like this where you aren't pointing fingers or saying, you know, you aren't listening or you aren't doing something, instead switching to I statements so maybe they can come alongside you and help, it's more of an invitation than like a finger pointing back and forth, I found to be very beneficial. This next tip in particular applies if you have had a lot of bad medical experiences like I have, I realize that I carry those into new appointments with me. And for the record, that's understandable. When we have bad experiences as people, it's really hard to just forget about them, right? But I began to realize that as I met with new doctors to try to figure out what was going on, I was treating those new doctors coming in fresh as if they had the same thoughts, opinions and level of respect for me and my care as previous doctors. So I get really anxious, I get really overwhelmed, I would think they're not even gonna listen to me anyways and I'd realized that I was leaving out key details that I needed to convey because I thought it doesn't matter anyways, they're not gonna help. So that ended up kind of being a wasted appointment for me and for them. Because I was approaching that situation like there was no hope anyways and thus really not trying to communicate everything that needed to be said. By no means am I saying this is an easy thing to do but as I have been able to kind of calm some of my anxiety and treat each person like a unique individual person, brand new to my case, haven't heard my story yet, I don't know how they're gonna interact with me and trying to bring a level of optimism into that appointment even if every single experience before has taught me that that is ridiculous has actually led to really good things. When I've been able to do that, I find that my mind is a little bit more clear instead of feeling defeated before I've even started. I have some hope and some motivation to make sure I'm communicating everything I need to communicate so they have the details to be able to figure out what's going on or to treat me. And this one is really hard when your body and your brain have so many bad experiences but as I've been able to, treating individual doctors as what they are, individuals has been really beneficial too. It's almost dinner time so they're getting very restless, aren't they? Oh, don't knock over my coffee. Can you go lay down, please? I've also found that if I am able to be honest with a doctor and say, hey, I've had some not great experiences in the medical community and I get really overwhelmed in doctor's appointments. Can we slow this conversation down a little bit so I can absorb things or would you mind if I asked you to restate that thing? Opening up and showing vulnerability and being honest about where you are if you're overwhelmed, if you're anxious, coming in with not the best experiences, allow someone to get to know you a little bit better. And though it is vulnerable, I have also found it to be really, really helpful to building that relationship and that partnership with your healthcare providers. Tip number four, are we on four? I think we are. Oftentimes people ask doctors, what would you do if you were in my situation? And while this can be a beneficial thing and if it works for you fantastic, I have found that this is actually pretty counterproductive to getting care tailored to me because the reality is, is that everybody is individual, right? What I want from my life and my body might be drastically different than what other people want. If I'm asking a doctor, if it was you, would you go through with the surgery? What I really want to be asking is given what you know about me, what I've talked about of my quality of life or the pain I'm experiencing or what is going on, what would you recommend for me? Reframing the classic, what would you do in my situation doc to what would you recommend for me given what I told you about my life? I think allows doctors to rely on their expertise to think about the medical outcome and what they've seen and their experience and give you a recommendation that's really tailored for you instead of something that they would prefer. Next tip, if I understand you correctly, this is a statement that I have found to be very helpful in general communication in my life but especially in conversations with medical professionals where sometimes there's terminology being thrown around that you might not understand or maybe the treatment suggested just doesn't make sense recapping the conversation with if I understand you correctly, it sounds like what you're saying is this pain will continue until X. Misunderstanding leads to a lot of tension, a lot of miscommunication, we got a shepherd crossing. Just recapping the conversation with how you've understood what they've told you can allow for errors to be quickly corrected can allow for a better treatment plan, better understanding of what's going on and at a bare minimum, you know that you've understood what they've said as you walk out of there. Okay, before we get onto my final two very important tips, I wanna give a big thank you to our sponsor today, Squarespace. Squarespace is your one stop shop for websites, online stores, or even if you just need a domain. I am currently using them right now to redesign my public speaking website which has been a long time coming and they have been fantastically simple to use. As someone who doesn't have a lot of extra time being able to go in and use their features to gain analytics, quickly redesign things, enter new text if I decide my old bunch that this wasn't good enough has been absolutely amazing to use and something I'd highly recommend to anyone. They also have fantastic blogging and commenting features, a lot of plugins. If you're interested in, for instance, building an online store and more and you can get 10% off by using the code in my description, using that link, not only does it support what I am doing here, but it also enables you to get a discount on your first order of a website or domain. Head to squarespace.com slash Footless Show to check out that discount and see how Squarespace can serve you today. These next two things I would recommend for every possible medical situation as you are able, bring someone with you. Having another set of ears in the room, especially when you're talking about something that can be stressful, that can be anxiety producing, your health or something that's going on, having someone else there who can remind you what questions you wanted to ask, who can remind you about things you might have missed, who can ask clarifying question to the doctors and who also can listen to what they are saying with the less biased set of ears is absolutely fantastic. My sweet husband comes with me to as many appointments as he can. I brought my mother with me in the past. Occasionally, really good friends have come with me as well. If you are in a position where it's possible for you to do this and as COVID restrictions apply, I would always recommend bringing someone with you if you can. The second thing along those lines is to always write down the questions that you have before you get there. I spent years thinking, I have a good brain. I'll remember what I wanna say when I get there, but the reality is, as soon as the conversation gets going with the doctor, he's asking questions, the conversation gets perhaps off track from where I originally planned it was gonna go and by the end, I've only asked one out of the three things that I was really there for and I'm frustrated and feel like I've wasted time. Actually writing things down and before your doctor leaves the room, like reviewing that list, did we go over this? Did we go over this? Okay, good. It can be really, really helpful both to you and to your doctor. It's shocking to me how many things I can forget in the midst of conversation, especially when there's kind of that authority figure power imbalance and when I get nervous in doctor's appointments anyways. So bring someone with you and write things down if you are able to. So having settled that to be completely transparent, communicating with doctors is something that I really struggle with. The reason that I've kind of come up with this list is because these are things that I have to remind myself of. Having had so many bad experiences over the years with medical professionals, it's very difficult for me to treat each new doctor, surgeon, nurse like they are an individual, unique person. And I have to actually remind myself of that because I start assuming that they're all just not gonna listen to me and not gonna care and so my anxiety ramps up and I get overwhelmed and I don't wanna talk and I don't wanna share things that I should share. These are just a few things that have really helped me in my journey to better communicate with doctors and I would love, love to hear any of your suggestions down below. If there has ever been anything that helped you communicate with doctors, especially if you're someone who has seen a lot of them like I have, please leave those suggestions down below. And I'm curious if you think any of these would work for you. If you enjoyed this video, I would love it if you'd give it that like button thumbs up as it does help it get out to more people but much more importantly than that. I'm really glad that you're joining me here today. I really appreciate it. Remember to use that link and code in the description to get 10% off your first order with them. To my beautiful, lovely patrons over on Patreon, thank you for supporting these videos and making them possible. If you're interested in joining my Patreon community, there's a link on screen or linked down below and to you, lovely watcher watching this video. You could be anywhere else in the world doing anything else and you chose to hang out with me for a few minutes and I truly appreciate that, thank you. I love you guys, I'm thinking about you and I'll see you in the next video. Bye guys.