I was on the "pill" and/or "ring" for 15 years. The appointment was always and ONLY pelvic/pap and out. When talking about getting off BC to have kids, I got a sheet on calcium and a script for prenatals that taste like candy and make me sick. That's it, no clotting test, no family history,

That's some irresponsible medicine right there. If you got tested for the Leiden Factor V and came back positive, it's almost a guarantee that your provider would not have put you on anything that introduces additional estrogen into your body.

no discussion of what sort of things the pill can do to your mood and health. I finally started advocating for myself and got lower hormone doses after nearly 10 years on something that made me crazy (Ortho TriCyclen!)

Actually that kind of illustrates my point: Ortho TriCyclen was the one that made me *not* crazy and gave me one short, reliable, light period. Everyone's body is different.

Now, with my good insurance, I might get further tests and I even got a real sheet last time:) It is easier to talk about your health when you're not wearing a sheet made of thin paper or are really just naked. I think people are fooling themselves that the prescription is much of a safety check. It's just another way to make money and force monogomous women to get a pap every year, necessary or not!

Fortunately, I have a good doctor who is genuinely interested in my health and well-being. She takes excellent care of me, explains all the tests she does in great detail, explains my risk factors for this or that depending on any updates to my family and social history I provide. She heard me say "two periods a month" and immediately switched me to a different pill.

The annual pelvic exam isn't just a Pap, or at least it shouldn't be. Mine includes checking for uterine position, check for lumps around the ovaries (ovarian cancer is extremely deadly -- far deadlier than cervical cancer -- if not caught early), a breast exam, a careful review of my social and family histories for health risks, a thyroid check, and probably from now on a PT/INR.

If you're not getting that from a $200 office visit (probably only reimbursed at $60 at the end of the day, by the way) then you need to find a better doctor.

Say "goodnight" and go

How dire that my life can be summed up in an Imogen Heap song.

I could have written this letter save for a few details (coworkers instead of bandmates, hair-pulling/hands around the shoulders/tickles/lots of leaning on and talkingreallycloselikethis instead of the kiss on the cheek, and a surprising suggestion that we go to my cousin's house on the Cape for a weekend ["I'm serious", he said! Well... OK!])

Its so easy to see things through the filter of your heart's strong desire. I have, and I thought the same thing -- things are looking up! But it turns out "that's just him", he says. I scolded him a few times, told him that he was really hurting and humiliating people by acting this way, and he seemed contrite. But then he did it again, so then I wonder, "well he knows that doing X when he's not sincere hurts me deeply, but he's doing it again so what do I make of that?"

I make of that one of two things:

1) He persists because there really is something to it

OR

2) He persists because he likes the attention and doesn't care if he hurts a good friend

I have no answers for you, I'm sorry. I have just as much difficulty reading the intentions of my person as you do yours. I just wanted to write to say that you're not crazy, that there are such things as mixed signals, and that the person who gives them off is just as much -- if not more -- to blame for unpleasant outcomes than the person who reads them incorrectly. Don't forget that part.

Guys are simple. He wants you, but is shy, or cautious. Make the first move and see what happens.

Wait, what? He might mean it after all?

Aww, crap...

Yeah yeah, I know that wasn't meant for me :(

He's not nearly as much of a douchebag as you think he is. He's not trying to score. He definitely likes the attention, although he did make one comment to me once, the first time I scolded him for being deliberately misleading (cleverly and obliquely saying that he was really hurting "people" quite badly by doing that) and he replied "Sometimes it's that I *dont' know* what I want" -- which I found oddly comforting, assuming he was referring to me (that assumption is predicated on the first assumption that he was astute enough to know that by "people" I meant specifically the person sitting across the table from him). At least if that's the case then I can say I'm not totally delusional, and that when he put his arm around my waist at the end of the night as we were leaving a concert, and when he put his hands on my shoulders and let me lean back on his chest at another show, among other small acts of intimacy, that there was some sparkle there.

I can handle a guy I like not being interested in me, as much of a bummer as this particular one is, given all that we have in common and how well we get along and frankly, how much more fun everything is when I'm with him. What would really break my heart, more than unrequited love, is finding out that a guy I thought was a good friend was deliberately playing me for a fool because he liked the attention.