What does it mean to be Black?
Anatomy of a Self-Hating Black Woman Part I: My former OBGYN asked the racial identity of my sister when I shared that she was an English Teacher in Korea that happened to also be fluent in Korean. Why wouldn’t my sister be Black? If a white male had done the same thing during an invasive exam of a woman, how would the medical community and broader society respond? If we are striving for equity, then are we not required to hold all doctors and providers to the same standards? Do Black lives only matter when the abusive encounter involves law enforcement? Was I not supposed to recognize this microagression?
Mount Sinai West OBGYN — Outpatient |50 W 77th St 1st Floor, New York, NY 10024
When I entered the clinical exam room, the medical assistant took my vitals and instructed me to remove all clothing, wear a paper half-gown with an opening in the front. The medical assistant left,I complied and waited for the physician, but I was nervous climbing onto the exam platform. It was the 2nd day of my period and I did not want to make a mess of myself or the room. Dr. Michelle Y. Francis entered the room swiftly without speaking and focused her attention on the computer screen. After awkward moments of silence, I greeted her with a smile under my mask and asked how she was doing. I noticed that she was much trimmer than I remembered and I was going to compliment her on her weight loss, but then came the first red flag. Dr. Francis hunched over the computer, rotated her head slightly towards me and replied “Everything is rainbows, ponies, and unicorns” in a dark tone. Her eyes were glassy and almost gray looking, this was not the ‘it girl’ physician I had met previously, the potential solution to my previous frustrations with haughty and dismissive OBGYNs. My good girlfriend and fully woke power to the people Harlem dweller had told me that she and all her Howard sisters go to Dr. Francis and she had delivered so and so’s babies. I guess that was enough for me to give her the benefit of the doubt, after all I know the bite of New York winters even irk natives that grew up here.
I could sense the bitter sarcasm at the onset of the appointment, but being a well-trained “save the entire world except yourself” Black woman, I tried to “fix it” and used humor to lighten the room. “Oh that’s right, the last time I saw you it was before the rapture when we were left behind.” I said and she laughed. In hindsight, I wish I had just decided to leave, when she laughed I wrongly assumed that I had saved the day and was not about to go through some effed up ish. Dr. Francis spoke about how she had advanced warning about COVID-19 from medical colleagues in Asia and I shared that I also had advanced warning from my sister who was living in Korea as an English teacher. The physician looked shocked and then asked “Is your sister Black?” I responded saying my sister and I have the same parents, they are both Black and so is she. The physician went back to toggling with the computer and had not read into how I responded to that inappropriate question.
As a brown-skinned woman with yellow undertones, coily hair I had neatly fastened in a bun and dark chocolate eyes, there is nothing about me that would suggest that my biological sister would be anything but also Black.
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Listen to Audio of Mount Sinai (Erica Rubinstein, VP Patient Experience) trying to convince me to do a case study after being insulted, humiliated and then discarded by my physician: https://youtu.be/vesdfNDGO48
