My wife won’t stop seeing her male gynecologist!

Question:

Yo I need your advice on something. This story stems back about 8 years. I won’t go into all the details, but the short rundown is my wife has a male gynecologist that I am not comfortable with. Let me take it back to the beginning.

When we first got married 8 years ago, my wife picked a male gyno. I couldn’t go with her to the first appointment, but when I went to the next appt this dude was there. He smiled when he saw her because he didn’t initially see me, but then she introduced me as her husband. Yo you should have seen the look on his face. This dude gave me the nastiest look ever, along with a head nod. He proceeded on with the appointment. I am pissed, but I try to hold my cool. He referred to her as sweetie several times and even to told he is she has any issues to come back to him, don’t go to anyone else.  It was so apparent he was being disrespectful to me, he didn’t acknowledge me at all and she did nothing about it. We get home, and I tell her I don’t like this guy and I want her to pick another doctor.    

Well fast-forward. We look for different doctors and find who we think is a woman by the way she is listed by the insurance company. We get to the office and it’s another man. My wife says that we took the day off and we are already here to let see if we are comfortable with him.  We go in, and immediately he refers to her as “pretty” and “beautiful.” This guy tells her to take her clothes off, and sit on the table and claimed he would be back in a few minutes. I promise this cat couldn’t have been gone longer than 45 seconds before he walked back in without knocking. My wife is there standing shirt off, one pant leg around her ankle. It was like he wanted to catch her naked. He didn’t apologize or leave the room; he just started to prepare his tray for the exam. My wife quickly grabbed her paper robe and sat on the examination table.  He requested he she put her feet in the stirrups. You know how most doctors ask you to scoot down? Well he stepped between her legs, almost like he was f’n her, grabbed her from under her thighs and pulled her down to the end of the table. So I am sitting here with this visual of this guy between my wife’s legs handling her. While putting on his gloves he commented again on how beautiful she was and asked her nationality. I held my composure while he proceeded with the exam and slid the instrument inside. She turned her head to the side and made a face of discomfort. What makes it so bad is this is the same face she makes when we make love. So this is completely f’ing me up in the head. This guy finished the exam and instead leaving the room so she can get dressed, he stands between her legs for 10 minutes talking to her about the exam and other medical stuff. WTH?  What made it even worse for me was that my wife didn’t even think to cover herself or remove her feet from the stirrups. She just laid there exposed and finished the conversation.

I told her I wanted her to pick a new doctor, she said that she thought that it was a little uncomfortable but because he was referred by a few close friends and that he was a good doctor, that she was ok with it.  I feel he is inappropriate and since this is making me feel uncomfortable she should choose someone else. She ended up staying with this doctor for 3 years and he even delivered my son.  He left to do charity work and closed his practice, which is the only reason that she stopped going to him.  When choosing the next gyno she was referred to a female by another friend. She was with her for a year and gyno left to do mission work.  Again we are left to choose another gyno.  I automatically assume she is going to look for another female.  The same friend refers her to another male.  The friend’s referral trumps my request for her not to be seen by a male once again.  I go with her to her appt and meet the doctor.  This one is a least respectful and professional with both of us and I felt a little more comfortable but still didn’t like the idea of another male.  She goes to him a few times and deliver’s our second child.  

She recently had to go back for her annual exam.  I notice this time she took the time to shave the day prior (which I found suspect).  This time I arrive late due to traffic.  By the time I get there she is already undressed and sitting on the exam table talking to the doctor.  They finish the conversation, he call in the nurse and prepares for the exam.  I notice that my wife has on a pair of her sexiest high heels and kept them on even in the stirrups.  Once again when enters her she makes the same safe and all the issues that we’ve been through in the past come to mind and I am again feeling disrespected.  The exam was quick and the doctor was respectful but it still bothered me.

This is screwing with me. I am a good husband to her and our kids. I know I am not perfect, we’ve had some arguments about this and I’ve said some things I feel awful for that I wish I can take back. But ultimately, it’s just because I’m hurt and it pisses me off that I can’t figure out why she continues to see male gyno’s knowing that it bothers me. I ask her why and her response is always “I don’t have a preference, I’m ok with either”.  The bottom line is she always ends up with a male. It makes me look at her completely different.  It’s like it is making me lose respect for her.  

I can’t type every single incident that’s happened these past 8 years, but over this timeline the situation is not getting any better. This is driving a wedge in our marriage. I find myself at work in the stairwell skipping lunch, looking at blog posts and reading forums about men who have the same problem. I found this one with over 1,000 posts. Women on there were talking about how they get new outfits, buy new panties, and all types if ish when they go to their gynecologist. Some women talked about how they get aroused. There were even doctors on there talking about how they tend to spend more time with patients if they like them, or even how some of them would even do stuff like resting their thumb on their clit for an extended period of time during the bimanual exam trying to arouse the patients they are attracted to.

I don’t think she’s aroused or enjoy’s the visits by any means, but this crap messes with my head. It makes me look at her different, and has affected how I am intimate with her. We have sex, but it’s not the same. It makes me want to be cold towards her. Most of the times it’s from the side or back because I don’t want to see her face, and it is just emotionless. It’s like I can’t get the images of her and the gyno’s out my mind, and it makes me question her judgment about everything. She knows this bothers me, and has even cried several times after sex. We discussed it, but she won’t listen and still continues to see male doctors. Her argument is her friends say he is good. I don’t care about her friends opinions, I am pissed she listens to her friends over her own husband. If she doesn’t value herself, our union knowing how strongly I feel about it, how can I trust she will make good judgment calls in any other area of life?

I have no idea what is wrong with her.   I don’t think I’m being unreasonable at all. The doctors being male is not the problem at all, but it’s how inappropriate they are when they interact with her, and how seems to be ok with it. Fellas, if you were uncomfortable with your wife’s male gyno that s that disrespectful and inappropriate and your wife continue to go to him what would you do? Ladies given the scenario above, would you continue to allow him to see you naked and examine you?  

Feedback..

Signed Cold Steel

___________________________

Answer:

Dear Cold Steel,

It is a given men and women think, act and communicate differently. If there is a problem a man sees with his woman, depending on the severity, he usually internalizes it until he can digest it. Men know that once they say something, they will be penalized for it so they will either a) shut up or b) completely lose it and go off.

Women react in a similar way (internalizing). Traditionally women have not been able to voice their opinion to their men for fear of retaliation (verbal, physical, cheating, etc.). Let’s be honest, most of us guys don’t take too well to criticism. So what happens is women, by nature, will get upset about something, internalize it, and sometimes argue about something completely different (e.g. taking out the trash) due to frustration and the inability to voice their concerns due to fear. The main difference between men and women internalizing is women typically hold on to things much longer. As my wife states, women were created to be nurturers and givers of life. They were built to incubate. As men we must understand the words we say are powerful, and once they are released into the atmosphere, they can’t be taken back and they take root in our women. They incubate until they are birthed into something (depending if the words were negative or positive).

Why is this important? Well just as men act out, women do to. If we tell our woman she is fat, she’s not pretty, she’s unattractive, we open the door for someone else to come in and fulfill that need she has for attention. It is hard for men to grasp that because we view “attention” as a physical need, but that could not be further from the truth. Females are constructed to have receive attention and emotional nurturing. That is why a woman can find herself in a situation with a guy (at workplace, store, church, etc) she is not attracted to at all, but be flattered by the attention she receives. And guess what, if she likes it, she may come back a second time, or a third. That’s a hard concept for guys because if we invest time, we want something tangible (physical) in return.

Your voice in your household holds a lot of weight. When I first got married I didn’t understand the power that men possess with their voice. Men show how they care though actions (visual), but it took me a while to discern that women are audible beings and have to hear it. I am reserve and I rarely told her I loved her. I didn’t see the need because I came home every day, and showed it by working hard and giving her my time, effort, attention. I felt my actions were enough, but I didn’t realize how powerful my voice was. When we, as men, say something to our women, we have to be careful what we let out. Even when mad, women can internalize that and hold on to it for years to come. It very well may be something we forgot, but it was something the pierced her heart. Problem is women aren’t made like us, and don’t heal with a few kind acts. Those words scar and eventually could make them act out.

I certainly agree that if there is someone is making your spouse feel uncomfortable that you should remove that person from your life out of respect for your spouse. However with every situation people can take things to the far left. For instance, if it is a situation of pure jealousy of say a co-worker, I’m not saying you should up and quit your job. What I am talking about is someone blatantly flirting, or doing something disruptive to your marriage, that person should go…no discussion. No one gets more weight than my spouse, period.

In your situation, there is some underlying reason to why she is acting out. It is impossible to speculate what the catalyst to her rebellious behavior is. However looking at it from her perspective, her behavior may be less about her not valuing herself and more about her feeling like you don’t value her. One thing I can suggest is something we personally do in our marriage. When we are so upset we can’t communicate, we take a step back, let some time pass to cool off, and try to discern how we contributed to the problem. It is absurdly frustrating attempting to figure out the opposite sex at times, but the first step is you must first acknowledge anything you’ve did that could have contributed to the situation. The problem is, in some cases you may not know. So the second step, and the most important…you must create an environment where your spouse feels they can talk to you without a fear of retaliation. That means no verbal/physical assault, no leaving, nothing of the sort. It’s one of those things where you just take it on the chin like a man because unfortunately no blog, website or friend could tell you what’s going on inside of her except her. Let her know – hey baby, I love you and I am here, I’m not going anywhere, but I can’t fix this until I know what’s wrong. And be willing to accept what is said as a result. The reality is many women hold on to things for years, so it may not be that cut and dry for her to tell you the problem. This could be something that has evolved over a period of years. Could be some resentment she built up towards you for something, and she’s trying to make you feel the same uncomfortable, uneasy way she felt. Or she may not even know herself?

I believe you are willing to stand in there and work it out; otherwise you wouldn’t have sought assistance. If the problem persists, you guys may want to seek some sort of mediation/counseling. In the meantime, I will advise to stop reading sites that feed negative thoughts into your mind. The funny thing about marital arguments is they seem eternal. Meaning, one argument with your spouse sometimes will make you negate years of good times you had. All the laughs, vacations, good sex, raising children, family moments…the negative thoughts fester and you hurt so bad you convince yourself it was awful the entire time. You have to fight through that period of time by feeding yourself positive info (e.g. the Word). Just as we workout and fuel our bodies, feed your mind healthy food, try to remain positive, stay prayed up, and continue to encourage her to communicate and be honest and open with you.

Be Encouraged!

Wisdom and strength to you and your family!

Truth in Love

 

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