"Doctor's Wife" label - Offensive or Makin' Momma Proud?

[GIGATT]

LOL... i have to laugh. It wasn't my decision for him to try for medschool...it wasn't even HIS decision... the pages just kind of fell this way. If he were going for me then I'd say "heck ya, dr's wife! YOu betcha!" But this isn't a road I would have chosen... it's rough, rocky and there is soooo much sacrifice that our family (us two and our two kids) has endured. This is about my husbands place in the general community and our long term position in this world. Eventually, we're hoping we can be medical missionaries (when kids are out of the nest)... it's never been about us as much as it's been about 'what can we do to help those who need it'

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[Jtybart]

I think the 'Doctor's wife' label is highly offensive, especially when you're a guy! The school even has a support/social group called 'Doctor's Wives Club'. Pretty sexist and backward thinking if you ask me.

 

[imalwayshungry]

i find it to be especially offensive... seeing as how my bf is going to be the "Doctor's Husband" himself. hmph!

I am engaged to a 3rd year and while making wedding plans, I continue to receive a plethora of comments about my upcoming role as "The Doctor's Wife". I am interested to know what others' thoughts are on this term. Is it offensive? Is it an aspiration by some? Is it a way of referencing a bygone era when domesticity governed women? What is it?

 

[Jonassen]

Almost sixty percent of female doctors are married to other male doctors, while less than a quarter of male doctors are married to female doctors.

Is this statistic actually feasible considering that med school admissions male-female ratio is 50-50?

 

[Jonassen]

No one has it harder than anyone else. No job is the most difficult.

I think people with different political views and cultural upraisings will disagree with you on this; what you said is certainly not an absolute nor universal wisdom. Of course the size of the salary may not be an accurate reflection of job difficulty, but most people in this world are not nihilists, and thus recognize the importance of various objective and subjective measures to discern hard work and talent.

With that said, the issue shouldn't revolve around how "difficult" a job is, but how much determination, discipline, responsibility and effort one places in one's endeavors.

I just feel like this thread is sort of dedicated to showing how doctors are so different and special. It's just a job.

Doctors are respected in society not merely for their salaries, but also for their widely appreciated work ethic. My older brother is a surgeon, and I admire him not for his 6-figure salary, but for his discipline, responsibility and undying commitment to others. My sister-in-law ("doctor's wife") likewise has the same appreciation. In my and my brother's worldview, being a good and well-respected doctor is not "just a job"; whereas chatting on AIM during workhours as an office paper-pusher is indeed "just a job." To downplay society's value of doctors by deliberately categorizing the two kinds of jobs together is careless and suggests a lack of critical reasoning skills or sincerity on this matter.

BTW, for context, I'm from a poor socio-economic background, as a first-generation Mainland Chinese immigrant along with my parents and brother. We lived on under-$19,000 household incomes in the States for much of our time here. Our household income in China was under $800 a year. I think we had it harder than just about everyone else, my brother and I knew about five words of English when we got here. Our parents didn't qualify for welfare and were never around the tiny efficiency apartment. I learned English by reading closed captioning off a 13" TV. Thus it's quite offensive to hear someone matter-of-factly preach "No one has it harder than anyone else"; and this though doesn't mean I'm complaining about having worked hard.

 

[N-B-tween]

"The Doctor's Wife" has become one of the most highly offensive labels I have been given by nurses. I have read nurses notes that said, " message left with doctors wife". Family members with questions about their loved ones care have been instructed to call the "doctors wife", she could be reached at home.

I think there are many preconceived notions about doctors, their wives, their children, income and lifestyle.

Off my soapbox....

TTFN

 

[Trismegistus4]

Is this statistic actually feasible considering that med school admissions male-female ratio is 50-50?

Yes, because that ratio has only reached 50:50 in the last few years, while the term "doctors" includes all people who have graduated from medical school, possibly as much as 40 years ago when the ratio leaned much more heavily male.

 

[Do.the.DO]

"The Doctor's Wife" has become one of the most highly offensive labels I have been given by nurses. I have read nurses notes that said, " message left with doctors wife". Family members with questions about their loved ones care have been instructed to call the "doctors wife", she could be reached at home.

Okay, forgive my ignorance on this one, but what is so offensive about a note that states a message was left with the doc's wife? I don't get it. If someone doesn't remember my name, but knows I'm his wife, who cares what the heck they write down so long as the message gets where it needs to be?

And why would ANY family members with questions about their loved one's care be told to call the doc's spouse? Shouldn't they be told to ask the doc? And since when does ANY nursing or support staff at either a hospital or doctor's office EVER give out the doc's home phone? Pager or answering service number, maybe. But never the home phone.

Yeah, my husband may only be an MSIII, but I've grown up in hospitals and doctor's offices. (My mom has been a nurse for 30+ years.) I've never seen someone, doctor's wife or husband, get pissy over these things or be asked about patient care. That's just odd. Or maybe there's more to the issue that wasn't presented....

 

[des12]

Hi there. I found this discussion forum by googling "support groups for doctors girlfriends, etc.." anyhow, my point is that my boyfriend just went off to med school in Grenada (the carribeans), and I'm having a difficult time adjusting/accepting this transition. Any advice, support, tips would be greatly appreciated by anyone who's been in this position, or one who's currently going through this.

 

[Pekoe]

Congratulations on your engagement!

Sub-humans made an issue of me marrying an officer in the military the first time I married. I was 19-- I was the biggest idiot of all. I fell for it. Six months later I was sick of that carp because my ex was only National Guard and he tried to run our house like he was Captain von Trapp. (And we'd only have a couple of kids together in the 30 months we were married!) I pissed him off and started calling myself a COWtess (Commissioned Officer's Wife.) I had address labels made of the Captain and Cowtess and sent them out on my extremely cool Christmas cards. (Can we say, "Fleece Navy Dad," anyone? That was 1988 and PeeWee Herman was HUGE. There was a character on that called. . . COWtess.) We divorced and I tried to make it a point to argue if I could keep my title.

I think that people don't mean their comments derogatorily but they probably aren't said to build you up. They are said with envy and probably joy for you. Can you come up with a clever response indicating that you are marrying him and not his profession?

Maybe at your wedding he can sing to you the old Bobby Darin hit that goes, "If I were a carpenter, and you were a lady, would you marry me anyway, would you have my baby?" That is actually a haunting song-- I think you should consider it!

 

[LADoc00]

Im engaged to a non-medical. Her family and friends (especially the friends, I think because most of them date nonprofessional blue collar types, cool people but they have very little $) make a big deal out of it. Telling her how absurdly lucky she is etc. Its all sickening to me.

Meanwhile, my fam knowing how much of **** I am, constantly shower pity on her for having to marry me. Also sickening to me.

Very much mixed messages and I am sickened by the whole thing and want to run off to Southern Spain honestly.

 

[Pekoe]

I'm so glad that you posted this and kept me from making a mistake. My eldest is a freshman and a guy that she liked in high school who is a couple years ahead of her and she hooked up this summer. She is extremely independent and I found out never dated anyone seriously because. . . she couldn't get this guy out of her mind. Turns out, he liked her as well but he knew he'd graduate and she'd still have a couple years left in high school and what's the point? So they really like each other and he doesn't want to tie her down her freshman year but they have a tentative date set up for June of next year at a sporting goods shop to get some gear for a bike trip to see if they still like each other.

He's a pharmacology student who attends a great school on a "free" ride. I hate saying free-- he earned it through his hard work in school and his dedication to being a wonderful person. He's a great student and a really nice guy. It is really, really, really hard to not brag that my daughter is dating a pharmacology student and that they seem to be serious and just enjoy each other's company.

Anyway, I have held my tongue thinking about what you have written and how doctor's wife sounds and just bragging about anyone dating someone who has a lucrative profession. I am happy not so much for his profession but for what it stands for-- a good student, committed to education, he has to be an upstanding citizen, etc. But-- most people don't think that way and. . . I introduce him to people as my daughter's white water rafting partner which they both like.

If she were dating a doctor or marrying one I think my excitement would be over his dedication to education and desire to help people but again, no one would see it that way or understand my geeky perspective. If she were dating a doctor I would focus on something that they love to do in their free time!

 

[DOMom]

Honestly, who freakin' cares? If someone gets that lathered-up over what their spouse does for a living, they REALLY need to get a life. Worry about something important like helping the homeless or feeding the hungry, not what you think someone else should think about your life.

ITA. this is one of the reasons i decided to pursue medical school myself. i couldnt stand the idea of being just a doctor's wife. i want to BE the doctor damit! (and i do take my role of mom and homemaker seriously, but i also know that my children wont be at home forever and i need to have an identity of my own instead of just being "dr so and so's wife" or " so and so's mom")
i admit that in high school all i wanted to be was a housewife (of a doctor, no less. BOY was i clueless about what i was asking for!) but fortunatly, by the time i met my husband i had outgrown that notion and was interested in a career of my own in medicine.
i get a lot of the "doctor's wife" comments as well. though it is mostly my friends telling me to not become a snob and not to play into the drama. my SIL is a "doctor's wife" and follows the sterotype of one that identifies herself by her husband's profession. i really believe she expects me to do the same. boy will SHE be shocked when i finally tell the family that *I* am going to go to med school too!

 

[DOMom]

I am noticing a trend here- The women (sorry they are the majority) who consider themselves the "doctor's wife" and really identify as that role and use the "we" term when referring back to the med school days, etc. are identifying that way because it is their only role (maybe other than "mother")and they are trying to classify themselves in relation to their husband. What about the doctor's spouses who have their own identity through their own career? I find it hard to believe that those women (like me) would consider themselves in relation to their husband's profession. I mean honestly. I don't get any special treatment for being married to a med student, nor would I expect it. My mother never got any special treatment, nor thought herself any better than anyone else for being married to a doctor. She had her own life and her identity, same as I do.

thanks for sharing this. this is yet another reason that i am chosing to pursue my own career. i hope one day that my daughter will say those things about me.

 

[ladynice]

I would be proud. Women these days are generally incompetent in choosing their mate - rap artists, gang leaders, rapists, murderers and druglords are their first pick. By marrying a doctor it shows you're not an idiot.

 

[Beau Geste]

I would be proud. Women these days are generally incompetent in choosing their mate - rap artists, gang leaders, rapists, murderers and druglords are their first pick.

WTF are you talking about?

 

[ladynice]

WTF are you talking about?

Turn on MTV and you'll see.

 

[Beau Geste]

Turn on MTV and you'll see.

Do you think all of America lives like people on MTV???

 

[ladynice]

Do you think all of America lives like people on MTV???

No naturally there are a few exceptions.

 

[Beau Geste]

No naturally there are a few exceptions.

Yeah, like the rest of the population.

 

[ladynice]

Yeah, like the rest of the population.

My friend works in a prison and he told me if you wanna get laid with hot women prison is a pretty good place to be. Everyday tons of hot women, "wives" and "fiances" comes to visit the inmates.

I guess the reasons are:
*They want to help other people (like doctors )
*They want a strong male to protect them and their children
*They want to play with danger

There are even cases who of female prison workers who marry and have sex with these pigs.

Do you want to know how many gang leaders who does NOT have photomodel-material girlfriends there are in the world? The answer is: None.

 

[MathisGreen]

***removed By Poster****

 

[docsgirl1718]

Can a medic and a female doc work out?

I'm a female medic and my bf is currently in his first term. He was a medic before med school as well, so absolutely a medic and doctor can work out. I've been on fire depts, I know how hot some of those guys can be!!!

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

The term is definitely subjugating, though hopefully people don't get caught up in it.

Women know J.D.'s and MBA are a dime a dozen.

That's why they flock to the clinical psychologists.....oh wait. I tend to avoid telling people what I do, for fear they will tell me about what a crappy childhood they had, and ask me why they are all screwed up. I once had an hour and a half haircut....when it should have taken maybe 25 minutes w/ a wash and whatnot. I also avoid my previous career because it screams "$$$", so I just tell them I do non-profit work and a bit of research....which is a nice weed out.

As for the MBA comments....yeah, you can do quite well with an MBA, though it takes a certain kind of person to make the big money. I considered a few places (I had some in's at a couple top 5 places), but just like people are alluding to a physician's schedule....the schedule of an MBA is pretty piss poor for the first bunch of years. I know both Harvard and Wharton groomed for people to start/run companies.....so you may jump to a firm for a few years to build connections, ultimately you were looking at building from the group up, which is a miserable schedule.

So if it doesn't work out for anyone here........I'm hoping to marry rich, so keep that in mind. I can be someone's house husband*.

-t

ps. *obviously this is tongue in cheek.

 

[SnarkysMachine]

I'm a Doctor's kid, a doctor's girlfriend and after getting every other degree I could think of, finally going to med school. My mom is a "doctor's wife" (never mind she has a PhD and about twenty other degrees) and she totally embraces the cheestastic-ness of the title. She's funny about it. When they screw up her order at Starbucks she does a Danny Thomas spit take, screaming, "Damnit, I'm a DOCTOR'S WIFE and I asked for NON FAT MILK!!!"

Since it's usually me (the starbucks barista) she's screaming at, I play along.

Women (and men) who are all caught up in the mystique of banging doctors are usually people that are unsatisfied with their own lives and need someone else's status to give them a sense of identity.

Most of us don't really care. Okay, so sometimes, I get a little moist thinking about my boyfriend wearing the white coat and washing his hands ten billion times a day.

I guess I can't say most, since some people do care. I don't care so much. I love my partner and think it's great that he has a fabulous job, but I have my own fabulous identity, so I don't need to appropriate his.

 

[peony]

I haven't read all the posts here, but I found that I also got this a fair bit when my DH got his PhD. So it's not just something limited to medical drs. I think people just thought it was a funny/cute phrase.

 

[gd152]

don't you know that most of a couple spendings in a marriage are decided by women? including the house size?..yep...we are the one making the decisions..and if i were a doctor's wife....why bother with decoration...i will hire a pro in decoration to make sure to have the cuttest house around

In this day and age, money can be much better spent than dumping it into an expensive house or car. I hope some women out there realize that being able to afford and take advantage of the future advances in health and aging are more important than putting on some silly rich person image. Health > Things

 

[wombatmd]

In extremely formal settings (e.g., dinner at the White House), this is the correct lexicon. At formal introductions at a small reception at the home of the President of my University after I was awarded my Ph.D., this is how my wife was introduced (as were all others). Husbands were called "Mr." if their wife had been hooded. The fun one was my good friend's wife, an ordained minister, introduced as "The Reverend, Mrs. Dr. John Doe"

What would the wife in a doc-doc couple be introduced as? Dr. Mrs. Dr. John Doe? Would the husband be Dr. Mr. Dr. Jane Doe?

This thread is kind of entertaining. Thanks for reviving it after 3 years!

 

[SDWife]

I don't have time to read through all of the responses... but my feeling on the subject is that being called a "Doctor's Wife" is not a bad thing. Unless, of course, it is being used to label you as a materialistic snob. Overall though, I am so beyond proud of my husband for becoming a doctor that the title makes me smile. Maybe I'm naive. We'll see how I feel about it once I really am a DOCTOR'S wife (in 5-6 years.)

 

[dotdash]

Being called a doctor's wife defines you by characteristics of your husband -- his MD -- not your own accomplishments. So yes, the feminists in the audience should object. The fact that there is some envy/admiration in the title that is not there for, say, "the plumber's wife" adds a little frisson of class to the issue. But the basic question is where does your identity come from? and I think most of us are more comfortable when our identity derives from our own characteristics or accomplishments than from someone else's.

It's like when daycare workers (and yes, doctors) call me "mom" -- as in, "Mom, could you lift Billy onto the examining table?" I'm being named by my relationship to the child, rather than my true name. (Yes, yes, I know it's shorthand and they don't remember my name, etc., etc., but I find it super annoying.) Why don't they just say "you there"?

 

[SDWife]

Being called a doctor's wife defines you by characteristics of your husband -- his MD -- not your own accomplishments. So yes, the feminists in the audience should object. The fact that there is some envy/admiration in the title that is not there for, say, "the plumber's wife" adds a little frisson of class to the issue. But the basic question is where does your identity come from? and I think most of us are more comfortable when our identity derives from our own characteristics or accomplishments than from someone else's.

It's like when daycare workers (and yes, doctors) call me "mom" -- as in, "Mom, could you lift Billy onto the examining table?" I'm being named by my relationship to the child, rather than my true name. (Yes, yes, I know it's shorthand and they don't remember my name, etc., etc., but I find it super annoying.) Why don't they just say "you there"?

Good point. If someone knows my name but refers to me as "Mom" or "Doctors Wife", then that might bother me. But I also used to be an elementary school teacher, and when students called out "Teacher!" to me instead of my name... it didn't bother me. (some teachers would feel differently.) I don't feel like it makes me lose my identity to be called "wife", "mom", or "teacher"... those titles are how I identify myself anyway. I am proud to be those things.

 

[dotdash]

Good point. If someone knows my name but refers to me as "Mom" or "Doctors Wife", then that might bother me. But I also used to be an elementary school teacher, and when students called out "Teacher!" to me instead of my name... it didn't bother me. (some teachers would feel differently.) I don't feel like it makes me lose my identity to be called "wife", "mom", or "teacher"... those titles are how I identify myself anyway. I am proud to be those things.

This is such an interesting discussion. I think the issue of when being called "teacher" or "doctor's wife" supports or doesn't support your identity one may have to do with the congruence between the situation and the role you play in it. If you are the teacher in a classroom, then the "teacher" label fits the role you are playing at the time. If you are "the doctor's wife" when you are answering the phone at the doctor's house, that is consistent with the role. But if you are "the doctor's wife" when introduced at a party, then your identity has been co-opted by your husband's profession. How much better it would be to be introduced as "Hannah, who can dance like Nureyev."