Share review of Mrs Paula Chaplin

Mrs Paula Chaplin 2022-08-23 Person 5 5 0

I am truly grateful for the difference that Paula has made to my life. Before visiting Paula I'd spent years trying to talk to GPs about the issues I was suffering. The responses I'd received had been dismissive, leaving me feeling helpless and shamed. I was made to feel like these were unimportant issues and most likely all in my head. After a nurse at my surgery attempted a smear, she sent me back to my GP. Having recently attended a womens' health conference in America my GP finally listened. Visiting Paula was the first time this condition was recognised with empathy and care. After years of being dismissed and shamed by GP's responses, someone was finally listening to me. Someone was finally treating the issue with the importance, care and sensitivity it deserved. It was a huge relief. Around the same time my GP prescribed a drug which lead to jaw clenching. I woke up one morning unable to open my jaw more than 2cm. As a professional singer it was devastating. It took me 18 months of chronic pain to get a consultant to agree to give me an MRI. I had torn my right jaw disk and was told to give up my career as a singer while a group of juniors (who I hadn't consented to being present) watched on. That kind of lack of empathy and care has a real impact on the way you feel about the world. Blanche Herriot has been an antidote to that. With Paula's help and kindness, my condition has become manageable. A whole part of life that I thought would be forever shut to me has opened up. I recently had a smear with Paula. The experience was like night and day with the previous nurse. Not only because of the improvements in my condition but because so much care, kindness and compassion went into it. I can't speak highly enough of Paula, Dr. Pritchard and the Blanche Herriot unit. Each time I visit the Blanche Herriot I feel so grateful it exists. It's a space where patients are treated with sensitivity, respect and kindness. I am sure I'm not the only woman who Blanche Herriot has been life-changing for. They did more than treat a condition. They made me feel like my pain mattered and like I mattered. Most of all they are a group of wonderful, caring, inspiring women who provided moments of care and connection when I was feeling very alone.