So I’m staring at my dissertation. All… let’s check now… all 343 words of it and I feel completely fucking lost. I know what the research says. It says being a Gay or Lesbian patient in the healthcare environment sucks. It says you’re likely to feel insulted, abused, have insufficient pain relief, it says you’ll be ignored, not connect with your healthcare workers, will present later because the chances are you’ll have had an unpleasant healthcare experience in your life. One of the bigger studies had 44% of GLB people avoiding healthcare interactions. 44%.
I just don’t seem to be able to find any words. I keep thinking what my supervisor said – that you’re trying to say what the research says and critique it. But it’s so hard, because there’s very little disagreement. And after today’s bike incident I’m just feeling a bit crap. A bit useless. And I know I’m not. And I know this is just a temporary glitch. But having a phonecall from my mum who’s getting grief from the kids in near her house again and not being able to do anything about it, and the bike, and being completely stuck with my dissertation, it’s all adding up to sensitive and unhappy Kate.
I could do with a shoulder to cry on today and perhaps the curling up with someone on a cofa would be good. It’s times like this that being single is less fun.
Does the research go far enough? Does it present an incomplete picture? Does it treat each patient, nurse, and doctor in a humanistic way? Why has previous research not been successful in solving the problem?
The problem is, I know *what* to write, I know all about the actual faults; I just don’t know *how* to write it at the moment. It’ll come…