Finding a New Doctor Feels Like Dating

I need to find someone out of the blue who I trust with my body — and it’s a daunting task.

Image by Anne Karakash from Pixabay

There are two kinds of people who see and touch my naked body: lovers and doctors.

So when I got an email from my doctor’s office saying they may no longer accept my health insurance, it felt like a break-up.

“Oh, no,” I thought to myself. “I have to put myself back out there.”

It had taken me years to find a doctor I trusted, a doctor with whom I was comfortable seeing and touching my body, a doctor I could verbally open up to about the ways my body does— and doesn’t — function.

It’s one thing to be vulnerable and exposed with a lover, when the goal is pleasure and bonding. It’s quite another to be vulnerable and exposed in a well-lit doctor’s office, laying on a table covered in paper, being poked and prodded with instruments and machines and hands and fingers.

I’ve had relationships with women last less time than the one I’ve got with my doctor. And my doctor knew far more about my body than those partners ever did.

So now I might be out there again, looking, screening, hoping to find the one. The one I can talk to. The one who will listen to me. The one I can trust. The one who won’t judge, the one I can share my body with in the most honest of ways.

Is There an App for That?

Just like in dating, not only must I put myself out there in hopes of finding a doctor.

I also need to determine what it is I’m looking for, what my needs are.

I know I’m more comfortable with a male doctor. It removes an extra layer of awkwardness when being disrobed. It adds a sense of relatability, that the doctor, having lived his life in a body like mine, can relate to the health issues I face.

But it goes deeper than that. For many years, I preferred a doctor who shared my religion. It was unlikely my faith had any real bearing on my physical health, but it did make me more comfortable in the doctor’s office.

The more we had in common, the more I would feel at ease talking through my health. I’ve since let…