Remember when we were little and all we had to do was see something, dream something, and for that moment it was true. I could see a firewoman climbing into her fire truck, and I then moments later I would be jumping on the couch putting out an imaginary fire that threatened to destroy my doll house. Tinkerbelle would fly across the screen, and moment’s later I was a fairy flying around the carpet with my clip on wings. After a doctor’s visit, I’d examine every baby doll, Barbie, and Polly Pocket, diagnosing them all with cuts, colds, bruises. When we were little anything was possible, everything was possible. Little girls could be doctors or fire fighters or lion tamers. Little boys could be artists or acrobats or teachers. 

My Barbie’s had tissue casts on their plastic legs, fake bowls of soup for their colds, Smartie pills for their headaches. I was their six-year-old doctor. I took care of them, cared for them, cured them of all imaginary aliments. Ever since I can remember doctor was my dream. One little blond girl saving her dolls has become a young adult woman planning for medical school busying herself with Greys Anatomy.

When I landed my internship at the Urgent Care, I spent the weeks leading up to my first day meticulously perfecting my work wardrobe, my grown up clip on wings. I had my outfits planned for the entire first week. I even practiced how to introduce myself to the doctors. My internship would be my first experience in the medical field and I couldn’t wait to start. A mere eighteen years old, and I was already stepping towards doctor. My only job as an untrained medical professional is to observe and absorb everything. My days are spent in four, six by six exam rooms. In room two, a middle-aged man is perched on the exam table, waiting to be seen, “Hi I’m the Doctor, this is our intern Allie, and she will be shadowing me today”. The man smiles, “You must be excited to start your nursing career”.  Its easy to correct, “oh no, I’m planning to attend medical school”.  His face morphs from the friendly smile, to wide eyes and open mouth, “that’s wonderful.” His voice drops an octave as he speaks the last word. I don’t know if he’s embarrassed he assumed wrong or shocked that I am planning to be a Doctor.
I am guilty of the same assumptions. If someone tells me the nurse will be right in, I automatically picture a bright eyed happy woman, with floral scrubs and when a male nurse walks in the room, I’m thrown off. Why do we assume these things? The assumption has become habitual. Women have been the nurse since hospitals were formed, woman have cared for patients from the beginning. The female nurse has always worked for the male Doctor. It is only the thought passed from mother to daughter, father to son. I dropped by my elderly family friends the other night, to return their dog. Barbra asked me about my internship and her husband Tom said “are planning to study nursing in college?” I smile and correct him. Tom’s eyes grow wide, a moment passes before his deep crackly voice says “Oh” with the utmost surprise. Tom is in his eighties, he was born during the 1930’s, a time before woman worked, before woman were anything other then secretaries and teachers and nurses.

Is the assumption that I am to be a nurse insulting? I think not, a nurse is a wonderful career, just not the career for me. I am to be a doctor. Why are people shocked by that? I assume its because I am female. Females are nurses. Men are doctors. I thought maybe the assumption is because I am a young woman, but today a thirty seven year old woman came in with suspected pneumonia. She elegantly dictated her symptoms with all the correct medical lingo, so much I had no idea what she was really describing. “Are you a nurse” the doctor asked. The woman corrected him, she was a Doctor. The doctor later commented to me, “I can’t believe how sexists I was”. Sexist, is that it? The presumption that I am to be nurse is sexist.

Is it truly sexist to assume my future career path because I am female? Or is just human behavior to assume. Freshman year, I assumed every teacher on my class schedule was female, I was wrong. I assume things about everything I do. The presumption I am to be a nurse is the same as the 1930’s presumption I would be a housewife. Presumptions are as useful as a parka in the Sahara. We live in a post Feminist movement world. More than forty years after woman broke the mold of housewife and nurse. Two generations born and yet I can’t be seen as anything but a nurse. I am more then my gender. We are more then our gender, and we can’t be forced into a mold. The habits of mind, stereotypes, might not have caught up with us, but that doesn’t mean we can’t do and be whoever we dream to be. Our world is as wide open as a child’s.

Presumptions are based on habits, generally held beliefs. Presumptions will not change; sexism will not change, until the general beliefs change.  I know I am guilty of assuming things based on gender, I admit it. I am frustrated that presumptions based on gender exist. I am frustrated I am mistaken for a nurse. I am frustrated that the “F. E.” before male somehow changes my prospects. I am frustrated. My frustration can only be cured by thought, work, and belief. Habits are almost impossible to change unless you force yourself to behave or think differently. We have to make ourselves uncomfortable. The doctor who confused the female doctor for a nurse, made himself uncomfortable by acknowledging his sexist mistake. By making ourselves uncomfortable, we are forced to see what is wrong about this situation. It is uncomfortable to change ones believes, but it is easy to see how unfair it is to judge based on gender. I believe that forcing ourselves to be uncomfortable will change our habits. I believe that one day I won’t be mistaken for a nurse, I won’t be anything because I am female but rather I will be who I am meant to be because of my ability. I will be anything and everything.