The way people online constantly say ‘talk to your doctor’ like it’s a panacea is a lot like how medieval peasants weren’t able to read scripture and they just had to trust their clergy’s interpretations
Sick of it. Usually it’s not even like if I’m trying to find out if I have fucking cancer, I’m saying oh i feel sad in the evenings. why in the NAME of GOD would i want to then, for that, find the guy’s number, call, leave a message cause it’s midnight, wait for them to call back, schedule something 2 weeks later, worry the whole time, and try to remember and rephrase in formal clinical terminology exactly what’s happening and get formal cold clinical advice for it from a guy I see twice a year. Just tell me! Give me colloquial advice and home remedies! good god!
There could be so many miracle tips or tricks online that really work but nooo people constantly shout ‘talk to your doctor! call your doctor!’ i don’t want to fucking call the doctor, medical environments give me anxiety and all the bureaucracy and insurance and bills don’t help matters either.
some zoomers on tiktok seem to get this and happily share ‘oh this worked for me!’ and usually it’s somewhat helpful and a very nice, casual interaction that doesn’t involve interaction with an authority figure and potential bills. it’s that easy.
‘ooh what about liability’ don’t care. liability has destroyed modern america, gatekeeping knowledge behind a culture of fear. if you’re so scared about liability over a reddit comment, simply don’t say anything! rather than leaving a pointless piece of advice that every single person on the planet knows is the default ‘ideal’ answer, that isn’t necessarily actionable for many who don’t have easy or trivial access to healthcare.
thank you, this is exactly what i mean. the problem shouldn’t be, as the comments are saying, ‘stupid people will do the horse injections’ – it’s pretty obvious when the tips are common sense and benign yet clever and helpful – like taking a bath if you’re stressed. it’s just such a preachy, syrupy empty message to shut off everyone else from saying anything because you need to repeat the boring disclaimer we’ve heard 1000 times. it’s so smug, i’ve never seen such smugness resonate off of plain text before.
it’s not “dangerous” to read people’s advice online, my god, you can get all sorts of horrible advice about relationships or sex or professional life or tech support or anything else you can think of, but medical advice – something that could be the most crucial thing you need in an emergency, if you have one of the many, many situations it’s not trivial to talk to a doctor – that’s where we draw the line and leave it to the esteemed doctor class, only they may know the secrets. why can’t people talk to fellow people about their health without getting yelled at that they should, nay, they MUST speak to a medical professional. we are not allowed to discuss the hippocratic realm
I replied this to someone else but…
I was having issues with positional hypertension, I posted about it in a bodybuilding forum. Someone said “I bet your caffeine intake is too high. I had the same issue after my morning coffees and whenever I had preworkout. Dial back the caf and see what happens” That advice was safe, free and easy to test. It worked too. The thread has a bunch of people saying “Go see a doctor” and a bunch of people recommending supplements to help. I looked at all the advice rationally and thought about it. Id never had issues with caffeine before, but Id also never been working out as hard as I was and in a caloric deficit at the same time.