#MEsplaining

JennyJenny

Well-Known Member
The act of explaining your devastating illness, be it called ME or CFS and often enough FMS, to your doctor in hopes of gaining appropriate medical treatment only to find your doctor does not believe in the illness or attributes it to psychiatric causes.
Term coined by: Frey Prevett

From Canary in a Coal Mine FB:
Canary in a Coal Mine

10 hrs · Edited ·
There needs to be a word (perhaps a cousin of mansplaining?) that means to be "skeptical" of something of which you have no experience, knowledge, or expertise.
To all the doctors out there who are "skeptical" of ME or CFS, if you received no training in the diagnosis or treatment of this disease, have read none of the scientific literature, and have no experience caring for patients, what distinguishes your skepticism (or conviction that this disease is psychosomatic) from superstition, belief or faith?
It's not scientific, to be sure. Science is critical and discerning but it throws its arms wide open toward the vast unknown.

Frey suggested: MEsplaining
 

Hari

Active Member
One of my personal experiences is: professionals or experts cannot accept the fact that they do not know. And given they are almost settled in life or career, they do not want to learn more.

So they blame the same on the individual who approached for help.

It is complete disservice to the community they are serving or to the service itself.

If they go beyond their own ego, and work with the individual who needs help, one may not have so tough time to recover and lead a normal life.

I believe apart from having a new name, everyone should be educated on the disorder and also on the solution.

Have fun,

Hari
 

weyland

Well-Known Member
And given they are almost settled in life or career, they do not want to learn more.
This attitude is unacceptable in the fields of medicine, science, and technology. If you go into these fields you commit yourself to a lifetime of continuing education. A doctor that does not keep up with changing knowledge in the field is dangerous, as we've all learned as patients with this disease.
 

Cort

Founder of Health Rising and Phoenix Rising
Staff member
One of my personal experiences is: professionals or experts cannot accept the fact that they do not know. And given they are almost settled in life or career, they do not want to learn more.

So they blame the same on the individual who approached for help.

It is complete disservice to the community they are serving or to the service itself.

If they go beyond their own ego, and work with the individual who needs help, one may not have so tough time to recover and lead a normal life.

I believe apart from having a new name, everyone should be educated on the disorder and also on the solution.

Have fun,

Hari
Nicely said...I just heard a political commentator explain Ben Carson's continuing gaffes and bone-headed statements as due to the tendency of doctors - because of their rigorous training - to think they know everything (lol)...

ME/CFS and FM patients obviously throw them for a loop. I'll never forget a doctor's palpable anger at me for his not being to understand what was going one. (He sent me to a shrink who said - I've treated a lot of depressed patients and you, sir, are not depressed :))
 

Hari

Active Member
He sent me to a shrink who said - I've treated a lot of depressed patients and you, sir, are not depressed :))


It is interesting and surprising to learn that we have healthy mind. But confusion arises as the nature of our spirit is to stay healthy and the body fights for the same, something else is more powerful so we are kept at dis-ease all the time, unfortunately.

I considered I was mild depressed, after reading your experience I conclude that it is the combination of confusion due to lack of vocabulary to describe the condition.
 
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Hari

Active Member
There needs to be a word (perhaps a cousin of mansplaining?) that means to be "skeptical" of something of which you have no experience, knowledge, or expertise.

I was trying to find something that really describe in single word 'rogue experts' or 'rogue scholars' attitude towards their own service.

I found the following term to describe them, which is not exact meaning, but I believe is a good match:

ignoscible
(Latin ignoscibilis, from ignoscere to pardon, literally, not to wish to know; prefix in-not + gnoscere, noscere, to learn to know).

Due to their ignoscible nature, they are ignorant and behave boorishly towards the sensitive need of SEID individual by being skeptical to protect their identity and survive in their jobs.
 
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Cort

Founder of Health Rising and Phoenix Rising
Staff member
I was trying to find something that really describe in single word 'rogue experts' or 'rogue scholars' attitude towards their own service.

I found the following the term to describe them, which is not exact meaning, but I believe is a good match:

ignoscible
(Latin ignoscibilis, from ignoscere to pardon, literally, not to wish to know; prefix in-not + gnoscere, noscere, to learn to know).

Due to their ignoscible nature, they are ignorant and behave boorishly towards the sensitive need of SEID individual by being skeptical to protect their identity and survive in their jobs.
They are ignoscible! I like it...It sounds like it means.
 

Hari

Active Member
Thanks @Cort, your feedback is encouraging.

There needs to be a word (perhaps a cousin of mansplaining?) that means to be "skeptical" of something of which you have no experience, knowledge, or expertise.

@JennyJenny,

If they are ignoscible, then please see if "ignosciblism" is what you are looking for.

Ignosciblism is a situation or condition where an individual is in need of help, and so called experts are clueless and create more problems to the help seeker due to lack of knowledge or experience or by being skeptical of what they hear.

I am wondering if they "ignosciblize" themselves?

In our situation, I call FMS / CFS individual is the real expert, not the scholar :)
 
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JennyJenny

Well-Known Member
@Hari
Although an accurate and fitting word, I think the initial question was, can we come up with a word like "mansplaning" for ME/CFS and trying to talk to doctors. Mansplaining is usually when a woman is trying to explain to a man things that have to do with women, so your are explaining to a man these things and to make it MEME and internet pithy like someone coined the term "mansplaining".

However, the conversation was begun by Jen Brea and OP put MEsplaining and I thought it was excellent so I started using it. Because we patients are explaining our ME/CFS to the professional and it doesn't quite get through.

Now, mansplaining is a tad derogatory to a man, I assume, but it was the example used when MEsplaining was offered up as a possible term. So, check out the FB page for Canary in a Coal Mine to see if you can find conversation. No one has really agreed on anything but I thought it was great and made a hash tag for it on Twitter.
 

Merry

Well-Known Member
@Hari
Although an accurate and fitting word, I think the initial question was, can we come up with a word like "mansplaning" for ME/CFS and trying to talk to doctors. Mansplaining is usually when a woman is trying to explain to a man things that have to do with women, so your are explaining to a man these things and to make it MEME and internet pithy like someone coined the term "mansplaining".

However, the conversation was begun by Jen Brea and OP put MEsplaining and I thought it was excellent so I started using it. Because we patients are explaining our ME/CFS to the professional and it doesn't quite get through.

Now, mansplaining is a tad derogatory to a man, I assume, but it was the example used when MEsplaining was offered up as a possible term. So, check out the FB page for Canary in a Coal Mine to see if you can find conversation. No one has really agreed on anything but I thought it was great and made a hash tag for it on Twitter.

I thought "mansplaining" is when a man talks down to someone, usually a woman -- when a man explains something in a condescending way. And I thought Jen was asking for an equivalent term for the way some doctors, who know nothing about ME/CFS talk, arrogantly, as if they are experts on the subject (mainly that they are sure it is not a physical illness). Wasn't Jen's post in response to trolling by people claiming to be doctors who ridiculed ME/CFS patients or the diagnosis of ME/CFS in the comments to an article?

This is why I didn't think that Frey Prevett's "MEsplaining" made sense an an equivalent term to "mansplaining."
 

Hari

Active Member
Although an accurate and fitting word, I think the initial question was, can we come up with a word like "mansplaning" for ME/CFS and trying to talk to doctors. Mansplaining is usually when a woman is trying to explain to a man things that have to do with women, so your are explaining to a man these things and to make it MEME and internet pithy like someone coined the term "mansplaining".

I see from where you are coming.

After reading what @weyland mentioned that it is not acceptable in any industry to be incompetent, especially when the individual's service directly impacts lives of many.
My intention is to find a word that can be used in general, not particular to ME.

If you are particular about ME, see if "patisplaning" or "patisplain" is what you are looking for. (pati - Latin root means patient).

It may not entirely fit again. The meaning from Dictionary.Com:
-splain
- to explain
1. a combining form extracted from mansplain, and meaning “to explain or comment on something in a condescending, overconfident, and often inaccurate or oversimplified manner, from the perspective of the group one identifies with,” as in ladysplain; whitesplain :

racism being whitesplained to a person of color.

I believe most of the times ME individuals explain accurately and with confidence what they deal with.
 

Empty

Well-Known Member
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mansplaining

I actually thought it meant the 'tad derogatory' (but highly accurate he he) way a woman has to alter her language and explain something to a man.

However it is the sexist way a man tries to explain something to 'women'.

In that case MEsplaining strictly would be the way the ignorant Doctor explains ME to the patient with CBT/GET, those little you are depressed talks, there is nothing wrong with you, lets book you in for a little appointment with a psychiatrist dear etc. But I get MEsplaining the other way around too.
 

Merry

Well-Known Member
What makes "mansplaining" such a delicious word is that "splaining" mocks "man."

So the mockery of "splaining" -- how does that work in "MEsplaining"? If you use the word to mean how an ME patient has to explain to the doctor, then is it self-mocking? If you use it to mean how an ignorant and arrogant doctor tries to tell the patient, wrongly, what ME is (not serious, perhaps not even a real biomedical condition), the mockery of "splaining" still points to ME and undercuts it rather than the yakking doc.

Another reason that "mansplaining" is such a pleasure to hear and to use is because of the repetition of "n." "MEsplaining" doesn't catch the ear. I have looked for a synonym for "doctor" that might sound better in a compound word with "splaining," an improvement on "docsplaining," but haven't discovered one.

(Why I thought this morning it was a good idea for me to use my limited mental energy to go on about this, I don't know. :wacky:)
 

Empty

Well-Known Member
That was a good read, thanks merry. I agree. Drsplaining doesn't work either. Unfortunately I can't hold all the info in my head to give it deep thought. Especially reversal concepts that fluctuate I have to have a good brain day for that ;-)
 

Abrin

Well-Known Member
Regarding doctors.....I actually talked to a doctor who has CFS/ME and his take on the whole thing was that when he was a doctor in medical school they were taught 'if you hear hoof beats think horses not zebras'. He told me that this makes sense when you are in medical school as a general practitioner (GP) because you don't want to be chasing after something rare when the simplest answer is the easiest answer and in theory this is a good thing.

Now the problem with this is that instead of passing the 'zebra' cases on to other specialists like they are supposed to do a lot of GPs instead close their eyes to the problem completely and pretend that we live in a world without zebras in order to stroke their own egos.

In case you are wondering, yes even the doctor who got CFS/ME was completely rejected by his own peers and looked down on and told he was crazy/lazy. This is how far their cognitive bias towards 'zebras existing' goes. Even though he had the SAME education and the SAME experience they still didn't believe him.
 

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