Rachel Pearson recounts many life stories in her memoir and reveals the unfortunate truth of how those without medical care go about accessing medical care. Sadly, many individuals that fall within racial minorities unfortunately live without insurance and are forced to seek care at alternative locations that lack professional doctors as a hospital would. Pearson’s storytelling highlights the connections and inherent differences in access to medical care between various races and classes.
Through her multiple life stories, Pearson demonstrates the struggles faced by individuals in racial minorities and lower socioeconomic status in terms of accessing health care. For example, when Pearson was volunteering at the abortion clinic in Texas, she was exposed to women who were in very difficult situations, some single, some hiding their abortions from their families, some undocumented, but, of the stories shared, all were Hispanic women. Pearson discusses the stories of three specific
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When she was a third year medical student, she was volunteering at the clinic with Dr. Billings and Dr. Leucke, she was called by Dr. Leucke to assist with a woman in labor. As Pearson was helping Dr. Leucke with the labor, although she did not admit to it, she was clueless as to what she was doing. Pearson expresses her discomfort and confusion in this situation, “this woman was in labor, and I had just violated her body. I felt mortified and awful. I wished that Dr. Leucke would banish me from the delivery room...” (Pearson 144). After the labor Pearson finds out that the baby possibly had a touch of pneumonia, she realizes that due to her messing up the vaginal exam, she “contaminated” the birth canal. Pearson discusses her frustration in how her performing the exam was purely for practice and the woman, Spanish-speaking and with no husband present, could not reject Pearson’s