My logic side tells me that there's no way a doctor could ever or would ever say anything like that or close to that. But my realist side knows that it did. I'm trying to write a scathing adjective to describe him and i think it's beyond my creativeness. So I guess what a dick will have to do.
If you dont mind, what did you say when he said that
I'll give the FULL way it happened so you get this:
The doc in question isn't a bad guy IMHO, and likes his humour, which normally is good, but there's a VAST difference on being on the OTHER side of the medical table, He doesn't GET that.
Most docs don't, until they are on the other side.
So we were talking about health issues, may have been my blood pressure can't exactly recall and he starts talking about how I need to reduce weight, which is a fair point, alas.
But as I explained to him, I CAN'T do exercise and I am ALWAYS hungry, and if I don't eat it's like a knife in my guts, guessing some kind of acid stomach issue it's like having an ulcer, tried prescription for it once but it made me nauseous etc
now this doc is stick thin and HE says he's losing weight to avoid possibly getting Type 2 diabetes like a relative of his (I think he said was relative)
and I pointed out to him that Type 2 isn't merely about obesity, 1/3rd of those who get it are NOT obese, obesity is just a major risk factor, not a cause. Good to keep trim, but life's more complex than that.
And he couldn't understand how I can't lose weight
so he said
"You just need to reduce your calorie intake...there were no fat folk in Belsen!" and laughed
I think seeing my shocked face made him say
"Maybe I shouldn't have said that someone as else got in trouble for it."
i.e. it's something doctors in his practice/clique HAVE said quite a few times
At first I said nothing, I was literally utterly and for one of the few times in my life, gobsmacked.
I actually just walked out in a bit of a daze.
Came back to see him the next week.
Explained ot him my Great Uncle In Law, guy who I loved, great wee fellow, life and soul of the party, always playing the accordion or piano at family get togethers, really humorous sweet natured guy
he was in the unit that liberated Belsen, and it majorly messed him up. He'd also been in battle since D-Day (he was mentioned in dispatches for what he did but would never tell us what)
He wasn't an alcoholic, he'd have couple of pints that was it but once in while he got blotto, to drown the horrors out, only time he ever spoke of what he experienced there
he was crying because he felt guilty for killing children at Belsen, because he and his pals who'd rescued these kids, gave them their own bullybeef sandwiches, which was too much for the emaciated abused wee souls, and they literally died from having too much food, from a sandwich.
what kind of evil is it that can make innocent men, trying to help children, feel horrified that their kindness killed children they'd just recued?
that's....obscene.
the troops had no idea that such terrible starvation and abuse required very specialist care and food to aid the victims.
there was other stuff went on,
the S.S. bastards in direct contravention of an agreement to let them walk way unharmed (much as the sokdiers wanted to flamethrower the swine) and against the rules of war (for surrendering a position), sabotaged the PRISONER'S electric and heating systems and some other stuff.
Some of the S.S. scum were shooting prisoners in the genitals so they'd die before they could be saved (British soldiers shot hell out of them for that)
And there WAS one fat prisoner, and I told that doctor this
more recent arrival Jewish woman who was a doctor they left alive kept fed to deal with the camp and I think secretly because she was iirc an ENT specialist? and the SS even though she was Jewish desperately needed such medical work even if in secret. like a backhanded excuse ot keep her alive as they needed her
If she gave food they gave her to help a prisoner they'd shoot the poor sod. Imagine the horror that caused her.
And for another doctor to come out with THAT?!
to me it just shows the nasty kind of "behind the scenes attitudes" in the profession
sure dark humour IS a necessity in such work, to stay sane
but, for long time the British medical establishment has been really nasty, like rest of our Establishment
was certain section of society that tended ot be doctors, often with emotional baggage because of that (sending kids off to boarding school and not caring for them etc is a recipe for damaged adults)
I grew up with family members who'd seen and been in the horrors of the 2 world wars. to me it was no "
oh, what a wonderful lark! pip pip tally ho, fight the Huns!" the damn media has been trying to portray them as. Obscene lying ratbags!
Belsen and Auschwitz should have been the *end* of inhumanity, forever, but...no
So, the abuse we have suffered is all just part of the great legacy of systems of CONTROL, leading to abuse and the abusers are often screwed up by the damn system as well
hence I'd rather stay in Skyrim or Fallout, dream of histories going differently, etc
sigh
