She’s Not Dramatic, She’s Been Dismissed: Understanding Dismissal in Women’s Healthcare

“The pain was loud, but doctors stayed silent.” 

“They told me it was normal. But it didn’t feel normal.” 

“They told me to be grateful I survived. But I wasn’t living.” 

The Silence Between Symptoms & Solutions 

It starts quietly, as many stories do… with a woman trying to explain something that doesn’t make sense. 

Her words are careful. She lists her symptoms. She describes patterns. 

She tries to stay calm, not to sound “dramatic.” 

But each time, the doctor says something like, “It’s probably just stress,” or, “that’s just how some women feel.” 

And then she goes home, wondering if maybe it is all in her head. But the pain grows louder. 

And the silence grows louder still. 

The Number Behind the Noise 

This isn’t just Brynn's Story, or Lupe's, or Nicole’s. 

This is almost every woman's story. 

Nearly half of young women in the United States say they’ve had a negative experience with a healthcare provider in the last two years… including being dismissed, doubted, or blamed for their symptoms. (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2024) 

Almost one in three say they’ve felt unheard in a medical setting. (National Library of Medicine, 2024) 

29% of women said their provider dismissed their concerns, versus 21% of men. And, the study found that women were more likely to be believed to be lying (15% to 12% of men) or to report discrimination (9% to 5% of men). (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2024) 

And a staggering 93% of women report feeling dismissed when seeking medical help. (Femtech World, 2024) 

93% is nearly all of us; our sisters, our mothers, our friends, our colleagues. Each of us carries the weight of being dismissed. 

In one massive analysis of over 195,000 patient records, researchers found that women wait longer for diagnoses across nearly every condition… from cancer, to autoimmune disease. (Arviv, 2024)  

Dismissal isn’t just an inconvenience… it’s a delay in diagnosis, a deepening of pain, a breach of trust. 

We’re not being dramatic. We are being dismissed. 

But why does dismissal persist? 

Medicine has long been built around the male body, from its chemistry, its biological makeup, its symptoms, and disease presentation. It’s been built around a man’s “normal.” 

Women’s pain, when it didn’t fit the model, was often labeled as “in her head,” “stress-related” or “emotional.” 

And this isn’t new. In 5 BCE, Hippocrates created the myth of the wandering womb, which equated women’s experience of menstrual pain with psychological distress. 

Women were not required to be included in clinical research until 1993. 

Entire textbooks taught physicians that women were less reliable narrators of their own pain. 

When you add in layers of race, gender identity, or disability, the harm deepens. 

Black women are nearly three times more likely to die from pregnancy-related complications than white women, many deaths that would be preventable if black women were believed. 

When Serena Williams spoke out about almost dying after childbirth because her pain and breathlessness were ignored, she echoed generations of Black women whose voices have been silenced in delivery rooms.

But, we are at a turning point. 

“Then I found someone who really heard me.” 

“I started asking more. Demanding more.” 

“I stopped apologizing for being in pain.” 

Women are reclaiming their narratives. They’re walking into clinics armed with questions, research, and a refusal to be dismissed. They’re banding together, telling their stories, and building movements. 

At SHE+, we are demanding that the system evolve. That research reflects the reality for so many women, that training includes women’s bodies, and that care begins with listening.

The National Academies of Medicine reported in 2024 that the lack of data and research on chronic conditions affecting women is “directly hindering diagnosis, treatment, and prevention” (National Academies, 2024).

This isn’t theoretical. It is personal. 

And it is the space between a woman’s first symptom, and her first answer. 

Every heartbreaking statistic is a story waiting to be rewritten.  

Change begins when the story changes. When the words “dramatic” and “dismissed” stop being synonyms. When we teach future clinicians that women’s pain is not an exaggeration but an experience. When we amplify research that sees women not as “other,” but as essential.

And when each of us, as patients, advocates, and partners, demand a healthcare system that listens as carefully as it prescribes.