How My OBGYN Reacted

[LostGloves]

How did your doctor react to your asexuality?

There's a questionnaire I had to answer before seeing a new OBGYN - one of the questions was, "I am attracted to: Men/ Women/ Both," and you're meant to circle one. I wrote down "Neither," and circled it.

The nurse entered my information from the questionnaire into the computer while we were waiting for the doctor in the office. She asked me the question again, as if I hadn't already answered it. I reiterated, "Neither, I'm asexual." She seemed confused, and a little flustered, saying she would make a note.

The doctor comes in, looks over the info on the computer. "Who wrote down 'asexual,' what's this?" she asked. "I identify as asexual," I said again. It wasn't mentioned the rest of the visit. But I received a call from her office several days later requiring clarification on some of my information. They asked, "Are you attracted to men, women, or both?" I said "men," because I was god damn sick my sexuality being dismissed as a mistake.

So, my question - have you noticed a lot of confusion in the medical community regarding asexuality? I thought, if ANYONE would understand the spectrum of sexual orientations, it would be an experienced OBGYN, but I suppose not.

[SD007]

Wow that's stupid. I've never been asked that by a doctor. They usually just ask if you're sexually active...

[SithLord]

I almost wish you would've kept insisting that you're ace, but I understand the frustration. My doctors have never asked who I'm attracted to, only if I'm having sex. It came up with my counselor, however, and she mostly interpreted it as me not being sure yet and ended up telling me to freeze my eggs because these are my most fertile years and if I'm not having sex and don't want kids then I should prepare for when I am/do. It was odd.

[FerlynnGoldbeard]

I told mine that I was asexual and she automatically assumed that I was aro. Just because I don't desire sex does not mean I don't desire romance and relationships. At least she had a loose understanding of what the term means.

[Evren]

I have never outright told mine that I am ace, she knows that I don't have sex but she has never asked why. That's a really odd question to put on an intake form, usually it just asks if you are sexually active. Why do they need to know who your attracted to? I could understand a question asking what kind of sex your having, but who who your attracted to sounds odd.

[Autumn Season]

What Evren said.

I am not planning to tell my doc I'm ace since, well, why would I?

[Lady Norgard]

My doctor never has, but I have a support worker at university. He asked if I was in a romantic relationship and I told him 'no, I'm asexual', and then he asked if I'd ever have a romantic relationship, because some asexuals like to have partners. I said I'm aro too and he wrote it down and continued. It just depends where you are and who you're talking to when it comes to this stuff. My uni is going to be way more knowledgeable about new things then a GP.

[tali.lynn]

Perhaps it can help them determine what sort of STDs patients are most liable for so they can test more accurately and efficiently, but there should definitely, definitely be a "prefer not to answer" option.

[Omitted]

deleted

[Evren]

Current training, at least for me, is to ask if you have sex with men, women, or both. I also add "neither or other" in there to be inclusive for obvious reasons. In that sense, doctors are really just interested in finding out 1) if you're sexually active and 2) with how many and what kind of partners. It's really to determine risk levels and to better help serve you as a patient, although sometimes that can feel like the most uncomfortable part of meeting a patient!! (I'm still bad at it).

Most OBGyns are seeing people who are sexually active. It can be unusual for them to have a patient who isn't, and they're probably so strapped for time, someone who's not on their computer checklist is like "WHAAAAAT". The most important information they're trying to find out is your sexual activity level and partners, unless that checklist was about sexual identity and romantic attraction, which is usually not part of your standard history. Doctors are not supposed to judge your sexual identity, and should apologize if they eff it up. If you're screwing ten people or none, our job is to keep you healthy, not level judgement on your lifestyle.

There is a move to be more inclusive of other identities and to raise LGBTQA sensitivity awareness, just sometimes the A gets left off (I usually bring it up so people will have at least heard of the term before they hit clinics).

Blah blah ranty rant, hope that helped.

I figured that was why they had that question but it still makes no sense. Just because your attracted to a certain gender doesn't mean your having sex with them. Hetro and homo people do experiment, especially when their young, and ace people can be sexually active even if their not attracted to anyone. I would expect a question like, have you had sex with males, females, or intersex people (speaking strictly about sex here, not gender, although I don't know why that really matters?), in the past year? Not who are you attracted to.

[Omitted]

Deleted

[SithLord]

My doctor never has, but I have a support worker at university. He asked if I was in a romantic relationship and I told him 'no, I'm asexual', and then he asked if I'd ever have a romantic relationship, because some asexuals like to have partners. I said I'm aro too and he wrote it down and continued. It just depends where you are and who you're talking to when it comes to this stuff. My uni is going to be way more knowledgeable about new things then a GP.

Yeah my university is like that too. They even had an ace flag out for Pride week, a bear flag, and everything. They're super open minded and have all sorts of sexualities and genders on survey forms when it's relevant.

[Kuroneko]

Wow was never asked that by any doctor and I see a ton of specialists including gynecologist. Usually they just want to know if you're sexually active and not who you are attracted to. That's so freaking strange.