Welcome to I'm Not Gaslighting You!

where a medical sociologist writes about the trials and tribulations of using our healthcare systems while also actually having a body

Thank you for reading I’m Not Gaslighting You, a newsletter about medical gaslighting and other foibles of health and healthcare through the eyes of a seasoned PhD sociologist—and, oh yes, a woman.

Welcome! I’m Karen, a medical sociologist for the past thirty years. I have built a career doing academic studies of doctor-patient interaction, missed diagnoses, inequality in healthcare, and basically how healthcare can make things worse despite every medical promise out there.

In everyday language, I’m talking medical gaslighting, why it happens, and how we can resist it.

Here’s a 2022 NYT article that chats up my research on Medical Gaslighting. Image by Marta Monteiro.

But also, (surprise!) I’m a real live person, with a body that doesn’t always cooperate and is aging to boot. Despite all these years of research about how healthcare functions, it’s not like I have been able to make it bend to my will on every occasion. I’ve been gaslit, misdiagnosed, had delayed diagnoses, and had my pain dismissed, just like most of people I hear from in the course of doing this research. I have been a caregiver like so many others, with the costs but also surprises that come with that work.

Like everyone, I’ve come home pissed at doctors and the systems that house them. But I’ve also gained some new perspectives and learned a trick or two along the way.

Your girl watching everyone’s stuff during a break from teaching night class.

Right now, I am excited to be writing a book about end-of-life healthcare, which has been my research focus for the last decade. Unlike my years of writing academic articles about research results, this book is for laypeople trying to get what you need out of healthcare. It comes out in 2026.

In it, I bring you real stories of everyday people navigating death, dying, and caregiving. Not people with perfect lives, or inordinate wealth, or insider knowledge of how to wrangle healthcare. I also share my personal experiences with caring for my mother as she was dying of brain cancer.

My mom and me, circa 2006

Using my social science perspective, I explain why some of the problems we see happen, but also identify tips and strategies we can all use to get more of what we want (and less of what we don’t!) when it comes to end-of-life.

In this newsletter, I will be writing about all of these topics.

Why am I starting this newsletter now?

I’ve been doing this work for a long time now, and I am weary of important research results not getting into the hands of people who need them the most—patients, families, caregivers, and laypeople trying to navigate a difficult system. More than just delivering results to people, I want to be part of sea change that disseminates information more broadly and also makes lay-expert boundaries more porous.

I want to be part of two-way conversations with people who are in the trenches of those healthcare systems.

You know, people like you and me.

What kind of community am I looking to build here?

I’d love to connect with people who can use some of the information I’ve learned through research over the years.

But I also hope to connect with those of you who are fed up with healthcare struggles, who are exhausted from trying to balance healthcare with the rest of life, and who are sinking under the weight of caregiving in a policy context that relies on unpaid labor from the same women and women of color who are already most underserved by healthcare.

I want to connect with the women who have called into radio shows where I was an expert guest and told stories that almost made me cry on air—but I couldn’t let on how their experiences moved me.

People call into radio shows with the most heart-wrenching stories. You can find my media appearances here.

I want to connect with people who get it when I say that I am drained by pretending to be an objective scientist reporting results (or whatever other professional role I’m thrust into) when I am also a daughter, wife, friend, community member, and a person living in a real body.

I’m interested in conversations that elevate our voices in all their intersectionality and realness. I’d like to build community with people who think we can do better.

What should you expect?

I’m writing my first book and also doing my professor gig, so there will be some trial and error in figuring out how often I can write a newsletter, but for now I am aiming for twice a month. You will see a mix of topics related to health, illness, and healthcare. Some of it will be research-based, but some of it will be more about lived experiences outside of healthcare—mine and other people’s. I hope there will be windows into my writing process and peeks into the book topics too!

Thanks for being here and I hope you stick around.

My actual writing space is a hot mess of post-it notes and coffee cups, but you get the idea. Photo by Andrew Neel on Unsplash

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