so in a couple weeks i'm going to be going home from this semester, & i have an appointment with my doctor. i would like to talk to him about the possibility of getting a referral to someone to talk to about the fact i've been feeling on & off terrible, mentally. my problem with this is i have exactly zero idea how to bring this up without panicking & dropping the subject immediately. for some background, my mum works in the same practice as my family doc, which is incredibly useful is some respects! she can talk to him before my appointments & let him know a bit about what is going on, & i don't have to tell her everything that happened in the actual appointment. however. i 100% do not want to involve her in this. i'm already frustrated with her in regards to how she interfered with me doing things for my migraines (i didn't want to go see a specialist immediately! my doctor said it was up to me! a screaming match ensued!), & i just know that this will go incredibly terribly incredibly quickly. i'd also like some practice for when i do absolutely have to do this by myself. i should stop before this turns into me just yelling, but in conclusion: how do you talk to doctors without just freaking out & not saying what you need to say?
I would suggest something like this: 'I need to discuss a subject that is difficult for me to talk about, and I need you to not tell my mom about this. I know in the past I haven't minded, but I do mind for this particular subject. Lately I haven't been feeling well, *describe symptoms*' Your doc should be asking you questions based on what you say, and they should be able to gently coax the information out of you. We talk with people about things they would prefer not to talk about/can't talk about all the time. I know it can be terrifying! Good luck!
Another thing that can help is writing the things down if you need to, whether you feel like you just want to bring a list of symptoms, or a whole script for what you want to say. You can bring that to the appointment and refer to it. That's actually a pretty standard piece of "what to do at your doctor's appointment" advice, so they're not too likely to think it's odd. Meanwhile, it should help you remember everything that you wanted to say.
