“Gynaecologist visit …or should I say: I want to reborn as a man in my next encarnation!”

Cairo, the 30th May, 2009

“Gynaecologist visit …or should I say: I want to reborn as a man in my next encarnation!”

*** All of us have our own admitted – or not – phobias and strange habits we keep from our fellow human palls. Some people eat boogerswhile waiting for a green light in the middle of a traffic jam, othersfear passing through tunnels and stuff themselves with chocolates while watching romantic movies. The variety of phobias and weirdhabits is as colourful as human beings themselves.

*** I don´t have a lot of fears, thanks God. I am praised for my wellknown absence of fear – thanks God for his omnipresent protective hand on me – and courage.But I have a phobia that I presume most mentally sane women share:going to the gynaecologist, specially if he´s a man. Am I being silly and backwards?! Is it only me or I´m not alone in my aversion to beingnaked with wide open legs showing my most private parts to a perfect stranger?! The fact that he´s a DOCTOR doesn´t seem to erase the otherobvious fact that he´s also a man with a libido, testosterone, desires and a very unreasonable motive to have become a doctor specialized on women´s inside businesses. I know I sound like my grandma and all I am saying sounds like pure nonsense but it´s what I feel. Maybe I am theproduct of some veiled catholic education too prude and body shameoriented to even understand that any man would have a natural fascination for women´s vaginas and uterus. Well…I quit. I just don´t get the point.

*** I have my own doctor in Portugal to whom I have made very clear how much I hate him, his white office with the huge “opening legs”chair and some tools that already give you a preview of what will happen during the torture session…sorry! …I mean, medical consultation.I have nightmares before any consultation, I pray that a small hurricane invades my road on the way to the doctor clinic and I am,unfortunately, stopped from attending my booked visit, any 5 minutes delay on the doctor´s side is reason enough for me to declare national strike on the spot against doctor´s lack of professionalism and…leave!LEAVE, LEAVE, LEAVE…running for my life.When I manage to arrive and get inside of the doctor´s consultation room, I spread my disgust at being there, I complain, I renew my hate declarations and faint 90% of the times. Groovy.

*** I declare I have a phobia related to gynaecologist visits. MyPortuguese doctor – who knows me for about ten eight years – will do anything to entertain me and has a gallant , patient way of receiving my attacks to the whole male gynaecologic community.. He will talk about anything, sing along with me while I´m sweating like a fountain, joke around, thank me for my usual hate declarations and also thank my mum for forcing me to come to the clinic.

*** Now what would happen if I had to visit a gynaecologist in Cairo?!Well, it was not the first visit to one of these medieval torture rooms. I had searched for a woman in this job but the best references kept going towards men in the speciality (why is that?!) and, somehow,I ended up at the clinic of a well recommended and respected gynaecologist in Mohandesin.The last thing I need in a gynaecologist is a clone of an egyptian Don Juan.Really, I don´t need it. The combination: EGYPTIAN + GYNAECOLOGISTWHO´LL CHECK YOUR NIPPLES AND VAGINA WITHIN SECONDS + DON JUAN ONATTACK is lethal and a total deal breaker for me.

*** I know how most egyptian and arab men are raised and how they see women´s bodies covered in tabus, repression and shame. The fact that someone who sees women´s bodies as the devil´s temptation is a gynaecologist is just not something I can easily forget and pass on without feeling uncomfortable, specially if the doctor himself has mixed feelings about my specific body and shows some romantic “so out of context” interest while he asks me to open my legs wider and get naked.

*** No singing to make me relax ( Hakim could give a nice touch to the traumatic event), no nice words of understanding towards my hateful remarks and fearful expression. Just loving, confusing glances that Icould not exactly understand and a dry approach to the whole naked subject.“Get undressed, please.”“O.k. do I have any cloth to cover myself? A towel? Anything?!”“No. Just undress and sit on the chair. We have to check your breasts first.”“O.k! (I am thinking: Ah...what a relief! He just wants to check my breasts while I am seated naked on this comfy white chair…it´s not that bad, after all…)

*** He´s writing something that seems very important on a piece of paper while I observe him, raw and naked, from the dramatic white leather chair. He has a “praying” mark on his forehead. This is a mark many egyptians get from constant praying and pious stroking while bending and touching the floor with their foreheads in religious rituals practiced – as tradition demands – five times a day. This is,usually, considered a sign of purity and religious fervour so in favour these days. For me, it´s a twisted detail that informs me that, most probably, this well recommended doctor is one of the many hypocrites praying 24 hours per day and moving on with their days lying, cheating and harming other people in many ways.I hope I´m wrong.
Having in consideration the “Don Juan” vibe floating in the room andsome displaced compliments on his part – not recommendable in a doctor who´s seeing you naked – the last thing I needed to be aware of wouldbe the “praying mark”, prelude of so many assets I am not fond of.

*** Running away. Is that an option?!

*** He finally sits in from of me and observes my breasts. Then he pinches my nipples and asks me the regular questions of breast monthly checking (the breast cancer prevention is becoming a BIG, URGENT ISSUE for most doctors) while I try not to throw up or just faint with the feeling of privacy invasion and extremely uncomfortable vulnerability with a total stranger who just commented how well shaped is my body(What do you mean, dear doctor?!) while testing my nipples with his bare hands.“ Don´t be so nervous. It´s natural to do this breast checking. Wehave to.” – He tries to calm me down, with no success.I am thinking: “No. It´s not natural that I am naked in front of a perfect stranger who happens to be a doctor but is also squeezing my nipples searching for mysterious milk or other weird substances. It´sonly natural to feel unatural in this situation, dear doctor.”

*** When it got to the “open legs” operation I was ready to fly from there so quickly that I don´t think the doctor even saw me leaving.The perspective of wide opening my legs to this pious Don Juan wasjust too much for me to take.Yes, I was childish, perhaps. I was, surely and according to my own tradition, impulsive. But I just couldn´t do it.Super Man in one of his rescue flights would seem like a wheel chairold grandpa during a Sunday treap to the super market. I must havegrown wings under my naked arms because I don´t think I saw myself leaving. No one must have seen me leaving…that´s how fast I was.

*** Later on, retelling the story to my friends, I realized I probably surrendered to my own fears and prejudices way too fast. Yes, the doctor was flirtatious and dry. Most egyptian men are like that. Yes,he had the scary praying mark on his forehead but that doesn´t meanhe´s a bad person or one of the hypocrites prevailing in dutiful religious masses. Yes, he was pinching my nipples and taking his time way toooooo long in the process but that might as well been his job.Yes, I was probably wrong but…great news! I am not perfect. Sometimes, I am as shy, ignorant, and moralist as any medieval monk.

*** Does anyone know a good (female) gynaecologist working in Cairo?!