I exercised too hard during the day and, by midnight, a sharp pain tore through my stomach. When I checked my pants, there was blood.

I called my friend immediately and had him rush me to the hospital.

The moment I finished explaining my symptoms, the doctor did not even pause to think before saying, "This is a potential miscarriage. We need to start treatment right away."

My eyes went wide. I opened my mouth to protest, but she steamrolled right over me.

Her gaze dripped with contempt. "I see dozens of patients every day. I know exactly what you women are like. Probably had abortion after abortion in school with zero self-respect. Now that you're getting older, you want to trap some nice guy into cleaning up your mess."

I had never met such an unprofessional doctor in my life. Anger flared in my chest, and I threatened to report her on the spot.

She barely blinked. "Touched a nerve, huh? I'm just trying to help you out here. Doctors have it so hard these days. Tell someone the truth and complaints are all you get."

The whispers started around me. People staring, judging, pointing. I had truly had enough.

Had it occurred to literally anyone that I might just be a guy with long hair?

"Bro, I'm here. You good?"

I was about to answer when Tyler Morgan rushed over and casually threw his arm across my shoulders.

The doctor standing in front of me, Dr. Holly Stevens, heard what he said and the scorn in her eyes got even worse. "You two aren't a couple? Girls these days have no shame. You call each other 'bro' while doing couple stuff."

Tyler jerked his hand back like he had been burned. He stumbled backward and shouted, "What are you talking about? I'm straight! What couple? How can you say that?"

Watching him flip out left me speechless. He was straight? Yeah, well so was I.

Earlier that day, I met up with some friends to play basketball. That night, they dragged me to this casual spot where we had loaded fries, wings and ice-cold beer.

When I got home and finally crawled into bed, a sharp pain tore through my stomach. Worse, there were bloodstains on my pants.

As someone who had been dealing with hemorrhoids, I knew immediately what happened. They had ruptured.

I called Tyler right away since he lived closest and told him to grab my car keys and get me to the hospital.

The second he walked into my place and saw the bloodstains on my sheets, he yelped, "Holy crap, that's a lot of blood! Did you get your period?"

I rolled my eyes. "Shut up."

He pulled me to my feet while saying, "You should probably wear a pad or something. Or your leather seats are gonna suffer."

"Do you hear yourself? Where would I get pads?"

Tyler smirked. "That's what you get for being single. I keep some for my girlfriend. Here, use one."

Wearing a pad felt ridiculous, but I was not about to ruin my leather seats, so I put one on anyway.

By the time we got to the hospital, the hallway was still crowded with people waiting even though it was past midnight.

I checked in and found a seat. Tyler looked around and said, "Dude, I need to hit the bathroom. Just wait here. Text me if anything happens."

Every time we went out, he was either in the bathroom or looking for one. I was used to it by now.

Tyler had barely left when my name got called. I explained my situation and made sure to emphasize that my hemorrhoids had ruptured and my rear end would not stop bleeding.

However, this doctor, Dr. Stevens, did not even examine me before deciding I had a potential miscarriage.

Except I was a guy… What was I supposed to miscarry?

"Listen, kid, stay away from this girl. She calls different guys 'bro' while she's sleeping around. The kid in her belly probably isn't even yours. Don't be a sucker."

Dr. Stevens kept trying to give Tyler advice while Tyler just looked confused.

"What pregnancy? Who's pregnant?"

Frustration burned in my chest. I was done with this. "Are you out of your mind? I don't even have the equipment for that. I'm a..."

"Okay, stop pretending. The whole tomboy act is so outdated. Look, your body is your business, but are you getting admitted or not? Don't blame me if you bleed out and die." Dr. Stevens waved her hand dismissively.

Anger churned in my gut. A doctor who was supposed to save lives was being this reckless.

At least I was actually a guy. If a real woman got slandered like this by her, there would be no way to clear her name.

Besides, I just had long hair. Were my Adam's apple and leg hair not obvious enough? She was standing there with her eyes wide open, lying through her teeth, insisting I was a woman.

"You're completely unprofessional. I'm filing a complaint. Where's your supervisor?" My voice turned cold.

Dr. Stevens seemed to get even more fired up. "If I were you, I'd want to crawl into a hole and die. You've got some nerve threatening to complain to my supervisor. Go ahead and try. I'm not scared of you. I've got a whole line of patients waiting. Stop wasting everyone's time."

The patients waiting in line immediately got riled up. "This girl's got some thick skin. She did something shameful and now wants to complain about the doctor."

"Seriously, can you stop wasting our time? I have work in the morning."

"Look at her showing off her arms and legs like that. What kind of decent woman dresses that way? If my daughter got knocked up before marriage, I'd beat her to death!"

Tyler heard all this and got pissed. "What's your problem? My bro can wear whatever he wants. It's not the 1800s anymore. Why haven’t you old fossils kicked the bucket?"

However, the more he tried to defend me, the less anyone believed him. The comments kept getting nastier. I quickly stopped him and told him to go find a supervisor instead of arguing with people who just wanted drama.

"You're still here? Talk about thick-skinned." Dr. Stevens let out a scornful huff.

I pulled out my ID and shoved it in her face. "Look closely. This is my ID. My gender is male!"

Dr. Stevens took my ID, compared it to my face for a moment, then tossed it back at me with contempt. "Who are you trying to fool? This buzz-cut fatty is supposed to be you? You think a fake ID is gonna work on me? Nice try."

I had only lost 40 pounds and grown my hair out. Was the change really that dramatic?

"This is my real ID! I just lost weight."

"Stop wasting my time. Either pay up and get admitted for the pregnancy or get lost!" Dr. Stevens refused to believe me.

I picked up my ID. It looked like I needed to get a new one. People had mentioned before that I looked really different, but this was the first time that something this absurd had happened.

This unprofessional excuse for a doctor was going to pay for this today.

"You diagnosed me with a potential miscarriage based on my looks alone. What? Do you have X-ray vision or something?"

Dr. Stevens straightened her white coat. "I've seen plenty of cases like yours. I can tell from experience."

I laughed out loud. "So the doctors at this hospital diagnose patients without doing any examinations? Just experience?"

I turned to the people behind me. "You all hear that? This hospital's unprofessional. Do you really want her treating you? Watch her turn a minor illness into cancer."

Now that their own interests were involved, the people behind me started getting uneasy.

"Yeah, what's going on with this doctor? Why is she making diagnoses without even doing an exam?"

"I'm going to another hospital. I'd feel safer getting tested."

"This doctor looks so young. How much experience could she even have? She's playing with people's lives."

Seeing some people outside already getting up to leave, Dr. Stevens finally started to panic.

"You said it yourself. You have stomach pain and you're bleeding down there. If I send you for tests and wait for results, you could be in life-threatening danger. You're ungrateful, and now you're twisting the truth."

She pointed at the chair I had been sitting on. "Look at your pants. You should get admitted now, or you might lose both mother and child."

I followed her gesture and looked over. My hemorrhoids would not stop bleeding. The pad Tyler gave me was completely soaked and leaking.

I should have just gotten surgery to remove these hemorrhoids when I had the chance.

"What mother and child? I'm a guy. There is no child!"

Frustration boiled inside me with nowhere to go. The problem was that Dr. Stevens was a woman. If I pulled down my pants to prove it, she might just twist things around on me.

"Oh my god, what is that? It's covered in blood!"

A scream came from behind me. I looked down. The pad had slipped down my pants and fallen to the floor.

I was a grown man. I had never used one before and did not know how to put it on properly. I felt like it wasn’t secure while I was in the car, but I never thought it would actually fall off.

Now there was no way I could clear my name.

Sure enough, Dr. Stevens looked smug. "I've never seen a man use a pad. That's quite a lot of bleeding. Looks like you're dead set on not keeping this baby."

"Oh dear, young lady, you need to lie down. Heavy bleeding is no joke."

"This is terrible. With that much blood, the baby's definitely gone."

"Don't be scared. When I was pregnant with my first, I bled too. You'll be okay."

A few kind women rushed over to help me sit down. I was touched by their concern, but I still wanted to tell them this was really just my hemorrhoids.

"I'm looking out for your health. Instead of wasting time complaining, you should get admitted. The baby in your belly is a life too."

There was life in my belly, all right. The chicken wings and fries I ate earlier.

Just then, Tyler finally came back with a supervisor.

"Dr. Lloyd, this patient is potentially going to miscarry but refuses to admit it. I apologize for the trouble." Seeing the supervisor, Dr. Stevens lost her earlier sense of arrogance and quickly explained.

"He isn't even pregnant! Stop spouting nonsense!" Tyler was furious.

Dr. Lloyd glanced at me, then listened as Dr. Stevens described the entire situation.

"Miss, Dr. Stevens is an upright person with a compassionate heart. Your symptoms really do resemble a potential miscarriage.”

"If we send you for tests before admitting you, you could be in life-threatening danger. So you should get admitted to preserve the child first. If you really aren't pregnant, the tests will show that anyway."