Date, please

WARNING:Today's blog entry concerns a certain "female issue," so you squeamish males can just stop reading now and go do something that will not make you squeamish, such as killing large spiders.

Today's topic is rarely discussed, even among women who laugh at squeamishness. Why is it, when a woman goes to the doctor, she is always asked the date of her last menstrual period? It does not matter if she is seeing the foot doctor for bunions, she is expected to know this information off the top of her head, as well as the dates and times of all her other periods since they began, and those of her immediate female relatives as well. I have yet to hear of any medical reason why periods and bunions should be related, but there must be some sort of connection there.

The average woman has enough on her mind when she goes to the doctor's. The groceries she must pick up on the way home. Her aching bunions. Whether she will have to put on one of those ridiculously tiny gowns to have her bunions examined.

In the midst of these worries, the woman is asked -- sometimes by several different people -- when her last period was. If the hapless patient cannot give an immediate answer that makes sense -- "last month" is not acceptable -- she is made to feel ashamed of herself for being so out of touch with her body. The question is asked so perfunctorily that the woman is sure that every other patient can answer without thinking. What is wrong with her? The frowning nurse plunks down a calendar in front of the patient to jog her memory. "Somewhere about...here" the patient will say, taking a wild stab at the calendar with her finger and landing on a date 6 months from now. And if she does happen to come up with a date that sounds plausible, the nurse will then inquire as to exact time of day, where the patient was, how she felt, whether she has eaten popcorn lately, etc.

After several incidences of this embarrassment, the woman might learn to rehearse, all the way to the doctor's office, the all-important date. If she is stopped for speeding on the way and asked if she knows why she was stopped, she will blurt out "November 22!" When she arrives at the office, she will write down "November 22!" on the sign-in sheet at the desk. The anxiety to remember it builds until, when the nurse asks, "First day of your last menstrual period?" the patient will blurt out, "I was speeding!"

I look forward to the day when I can go to the foot doctor -- or any other doctor -- and not be asked this question, probably when I'm about 83. But by then, I'll probably know the answer.