Shownotes
Pain is one of the most common reasons women go to the doctor, and also one of the most commonly dismissed areas of female health.
In this episode, I’m breaking down how to describe pain to your doctor in a way that can be understood and evaluated. Since pain is subjective and difficult to measure, doctors rely heavily on how it’s communicated, and most women are never taught how to explain their pain clearly.
I talk about why pain scales are limited, why women’s pain is often normalized or dismissed, and how that impacts diagnosis and treatment.
You’ll learn a simple framework for describing pain, including how to explain sensation, location, timing, triggers, and how pain affects your ability to function. This gives your doctor the structure they need to interpret your symptoms and move your care forward.
I also talk about one of the most important phrases you can use in a medical appointment, “this is not normal for me,” and why understanding your baseline is key to being taken seriously.
If you’ve ever struggled with how to explain your pain, felt dismissed by a doctor, or left an appointment without answers, this episode will give you a practical way to communicate your symptoms more clearly.
Timestamps:
[00:00:16] Recap from Last Week: Emergency Room Advocacy
[00:01:50] Why Women’s Pain Is Dismissed
[00:02:50] Why Pain Is Hard to Measure
[00:03:15] The Problem with Pain Scales
[00:04:40] Why “It Hurts” Isn’t Enough
[00:05:23] The Pain Formula
[00:06:56] Finding Your Baseline
[00:08:00] “This Is Not Normal for Me”
[00:09:15] Specific Language to Describe Your Pain
[00:10:23] Language That Can Undermine You
[00:11:45] Coming Up Next Week: The Importance of The Medical ID
Resources From This Episode:
How To Describe Pain Cheat Sheet Free PDF Download
BBC Article: The Case for Renaming Female Body Parts
More Free Cheat Sheet Downloads from The Hairy Chin:
The One Page Health Summary Cheat Sheet from episode “The One Page That Changes Every Dr. Appointment”
How To Describe Your Symptoms Cheat Sheet from episode "Struggling To Explain Symptoms To Your Doctor?"
Where Else to Find The Hairy Chin:
Transcripts
Welcome back to the podcast. Last week I talked with Golda Arthur about her experience walking into a New York City emergency room for the worst headache she had ever experienced. In today's episode, I want to go deeper into that conversation to talk about pain, especially female pain. Because pain is one of the most common reasons women go to the doctor and it's also one of the most commonly dismissed areas of female health.
And it's not because it isn't real or valid, but it's because of how it's understood and communicated.
So in today's episode, I'm going to talk about why women's pain is taken less seriously in medical settings, how we can shift language to help bridge communication gaps, and a clear formula that can help communicate pain in a way that doctors can interpret.
And for next week, I'm going to continue building your advocacy toolkits with an episode about what happens when you don't have the ability to communicate for yourself and why something as simple as a medical ID can make a huge difference.
Today's episode will be packed with some specific information, words, and phrases. So before I get started, I want you to know that there is a free PDF download. It accompanies this episode.
You can find it linked in the show notes and also at theherrychin.com. So for now, just sit back and listen and know that you'll have access to all of this information so you can reference it whenever you need it.
I want to start by saying that I will never point the finger or blame a woman for not being able to communicate her symptoms and especially her pain because women were never taught the rules of the medical systems game. And in fact, we really weren't even invited to play in it in the first place. So how can you place blame on someone for not succeeding in something that they were never taught how to do?
I just finished reading an article from the BBC recently called The Case for Renaming Women's Body Parts. And I can add it in the show notes. And this article is about how female body parts, especially in the pelvic region, were named by men.
Healthcare has been a man's world. Now look, things are starting to shift slowly, but I continue to believe that women have so much capacity to elbow our way further in. We can fight for our space, we can learn and change the rules, and we can actively participate in the game of female healthcare.
So now I wanna talk about the how and about pain. Pain is complicated because it's incredibly subjective and it's very hard to measure. There isn't a test that says, yes, you are in pain or a scan that says, wow, you are really hurting. Doctors aren't working with data. They're working with interpretations.
And to bridge this gap, the medical system created pain scales. And so you know these, this is the rate your pain from one to 10. I talked about this with Golda in the last episode.
These pain scales are standardized ways to measure pain because otherwise, how can you or the medical systems describe it? And I do believe that pain scales have a purpose. They are useful in emergencies when doctors need to track changes quickly. But outside of that, they can be incredibly limiting.
especially because they assume that everyone experiences pain in the same way. And for female health, that's just not true.
Women have been dealing with pain for the majority of their lives, starting with puberty and menstruation, And it has become so normalized that their pain is acceptable. And because of this, women aren't rating their pain at the highest levels because they've adapted and learned to function through it.
So when they call their period pain or chronic discomfort or ongoing symptoms of five, it might actually be an eight.
And on top of all of that, it can't go without saying that pain is emotional. It's overwhelming, it's hard to think clearly, and you're often trying to explain it in real time with someone asking you questions and you being expected to describe it with perfect clarity. And it's not realistic. And it's one of the barriers of why it's so hard for women to describe their pain.
Okay, so if we can't measure pain directly, then we have no choice but to describe it clearly. Because while a number tells a doctor the intensity, it doesn't give them any further information.
I want to talk about how we can give more clarity to our pain and how it's affecting our bodies. In an earlier episode, I talked about ways to communicate with your doctor and I walked through how doctors are data-driven solution-based practitioners. In that episode, I share the symptom formula. It is a way to describe symptoms specifically and clearly
doctors can translate that data. And that's what we're going to continue today, building on that skill, talking about pain.
Now the language we use around pain is really important because instead of focusing only on intensity like the pain scales, we are able to add so much context with the words that we choose. We can explain where the pain is, what it actually feels like, when it happens, and so many more details.
And look, if you're not sure how to describe these things, it's completely normal because most of us were never given the language and the skills to do this. So I want to break it down in a clear and simple way like I did for the symptom formula. when you think about your pain, I want you to think about it in this way.
What does it feel like? Where is it located? When does it happen? What is affecting it? And how is it impacting your life? And I'm gonna touch on this last part more in just a minute because I believe here is where pain can be easily normalized. you'll find this pain formula in the PDF download written out in a very easy to read way.
So here is an example for you. Instead of saying, stomach hurts really badly, you might consider saying, I am experiencing sharp pain in my lower right abdomen. It comes and goes, especially after eating. It gets worse with movement, and it's making it hard for me to stand upright for long periods of time. That language is so descriptive, and it gives a much clearer picture of what your body is experiencing.
Now here's where I want to talk for a minute about the normalization of female pain, because there is a huge gap in the communication between doctors and patients, especially female patients in this area.
And this for me, as I said before, I'll never point fingers or place blame, but it's where women need to take accountability for their connections to their bodies.
because we have to know our baselines. If we are talking about the word normal, the only normal that we can know is from our own individual experiences inside of our own bodies. Because just like pain scales, normal is subjective and different for every person. Your four could easily be my seven.
So if we can learn how to really pay attention, to listen, and to understand what our own normals are, then we have a baseline.
And from there, we can move to being able to communicate that yes, this is average for me or this is better. And most importantly, that this is worse for me or that this is not normal.
In my experience, the most important way you can communicate urgency and attention from a doctor is by saying, this is not normal for me. And this for me does many things. It pushes back against the normalization, especially when speaking about how pain impacts daily life. It also signals a change and it demonstrates to the practitioner that you are aware that it has deviated from your baseline.
And I want to add here, I've said how important it is to know your baseline, and I do fully believe that, but that's also a skill. We aren't taught to listen to our bodies, to connect to them, to pay attention when they're speaking to us. Sometimes they're just whispering to us.
We are busy, we are multitasking, and especially in our modern lives that are so fast-paced,
it is so incredibly easy to dismiss what our bodies are trying to tell us.
That disconnect
real, and it's another huge barrier in female healthcare.
So this is something that I'm definitely going to be coming back to and going much deeper into in future episodes because learning how to understand your body is just as important as communicating what is happening inside of it.
Now another skill we can build on is not just how we say the words, but finding the right words to describe what our bodies are experiencing. Because saying it hurts is real and valid, but it's not specific. And even having a few more words in your vocabulary can make a huge difference.
So when describing the sensation of pain, you might say it's sharp, dull, burning, pressure, or cramping. Instead of my stomach, you might say lower abdomen, right side, pelvic area,
When you're thinking about timing, you can start to notice things like whether it comes and goes, if it's constant, if it happens after you eat or around your menstrual cycle, also at certain times of the day. Even those small shifts start to give your doctor a much clearer picture of what's happening.
Now I'm not going to go through every possible word here because it would be a lot, but I have put together in the PDF a full list. So if you ever felt like you don't know exactly how to describe these symptoms, that's exactly what that's there for.
Now in the communication episode, also talk about things to avoid when communicating symptoms with your doctor. It is very similar with pain. Women are taught to minimize themselves and to soften their language. And the area of pain is where they do this the most.
So this is where we need to fight against those ingrained automatic responses to questions about how much pain we're in. Because change is not easy, and it goes against the grain. So taking a deep breath, thinking intentionally, and answering with conviction is really important.
It can also be useful to avoid the following phrases. I'm probably overreacting. It's not that bad. I know everyone has this. And minimizing or apologizing. Because remember, you don't need to downplay your experiences. Because while it may feel like you're trying to be reasonable, It actually makes your symptoms harder to evaluate.
I want to gently remind you that self-advocacy isn't about your personality. It's not about sounding clinical or speaking in a way that you aren't comfortable with. It's about being clear, presenting what is happening inside of your body In a way that your physician can interpret.
Because when there's that clarity, there's a much better chance of things moving forward and you finding the treatment and relief that you deserve.
Okay, so this is where I will leave you for today. A lot of what I've talked about this season is honing the skills of communicating as you advocate for your health. But the truth is sometimes that's not possible. There may be times when you actually can't communicate for yourself, where a situation is so fast paced and you need quick access to pertinent medical information.
So that's what I'm getting into next week. A simple but mighty act of advocacy, which is the medical ID.
because in some moments your information has to speak for you.
Remember, you can download the free PDF for today's episode in the show notes below or at theheriton.com. Thanks for being here. And again, thanks for hitting that follow button. I'll see you next time.
