Aston sought medical help after her symptoms—which included severe migraines, abdominal pain, joint dislocations, easy bruising, iron deficiency, fainting, tachycardia, and multiple injuries—began in 2015, per the New Zealand Herald. She was referred to Auckland Hospital, where a doctor accused her of causing her own illness. Because of his accusations, Aston was placed on psychiatric watch.
Research suggests women are often much more likely to be misdiagnosed than men. A 2009 study of patients with heart disease symptoms found 31.3 per cent of middle-aged women “received a mental health condition as the most certain diagnosis”, compared to just 15.6 per cent of their male counterparts. Additionally, a 2020 study found that as many as 75.2 per cent of patients with endometriosis—a painful disorder that affects the tissue of the uterus—had been misdiagnosed after they started experiencing endometriosis symptoms. Among those women, nearly 50 per cent were told they had a “mental health problem”.
Try it from this angle:
Why would we think they need to be told this? Why think that two people who are qualified enough to have a student on board need to be told this?
We have no reason to think their norm isn’t measured and calm. We have no reason to think the judgement of the senior in the room wasn’t that her rant would be the best thing for the student.
Sometimes a short sharp shock can be the best lesson. And, of course, a ‘telling off’ is different to a personal attack.
We weren’t there so we shouldn’t assume that she and her co-worker don’t know better than us what the student needed in the moment.
We can give them the benefit of the doubt and trust their expertise.
It can go without saying.
True. I agree with what you said. I guess I used a more general approach which is not specific to this situation.
It’s just, based on the OP’s description, it sounded like OP found an opportunity to vent all her frustrations into with no resistance.
The entire last paragraph rubbed me the wrong way. It felt unnecessary and detrimental to their goal.
I get what you’re saying. I guess I want to add the context that I knew the student, he’d been a co-worker and we had a good working relationship and we already respected each other. He was going to listen to me when I opened my mouth, just like I would listen to him if he had criticism of something I did. My “rant” wasn’t yelling, it wasn’t overly emotional, it was a “as a man you have no idea what it’s like so I’m going to tell you and I’m going to tell you some actual real life experiences because maybe now you’ll have some compassion and remember this and not be an asshole next time.” And my partner let me do it because he recognized that the message was going to come across way better from a woman who’s lived it than from a man. And you can tell me that I shouldn’t have done it, but in that situation it worked. That student was going to remember it.