Why are GPs scary?

So, I'm married to a doctor. I know lots of doctors. They are all nice people. And yet the one encounter with super horrible doctor at Leeds Student Medical Practice about six and a half years ago seems to have been enough to make me fear going to the GP hugely unless I know exactly who it is. (Like some of the lovely, lovely ones at Burley Park - then again BP also had some crazy GPs...but at least you could mostly avoid them once you'd found out who they were...)
So today, I had to venture to my first New Zealand GP. I will try to spare too many of the details of why I had to go to the GP but they may escape so if you don't want to know, stop reading now...
I was really quite nervous. Partly it was just the practicalities that bothered me - knowing I'd have to pay but what forms of payment did they take? how do prescriptions work? How long are appointments? Are they as obsessed with the 10 minute rule as the NHS? So nothing all that scary but just putting myself in a position where I didn't know things that I felt I ought to know. But then what tests might they decide I needed doing? Would I need any tests just in the routine new patient way? And might they say something was actually wrong with me? Would they be mean like the LSMP GP who tried to make me cry or the BP GP who was VERY obsessed with the 10-minute-rule...?
Turned out, he was a very friendly GP who I impressed with my history giving skills. (Thanks to Husbink's training following the horrid LSMP GP.) But it also turned out that he did think there might be something wrong with me. I'm so used to going to the GP and being told there is nothing more they can do with the whole IBS thing that to go and be told that my symptoms actually add up to sound like a specific thing was quite a shock but also in a strange way kind of relieving. I did get to feeling like the IBS was my fault with some of the GPs and that I should just get over it. To be told "you may have this" and "we can do this, this and this to find out" was almost exciting. I say almost. It is something I'd rather not have and *may* cause some larger problems further down the line and could be pretty scary. But for just a few minutes thinking there might be answers was pretty cool. I've got at least two lots of tests to have now, probably three. We shall see.
So, in other news... The MMC stuff continues to dominate thoughts. The interview is hopefully cancelled now. The second round has been declared but its timing is still pretty bad for us. In some ways I wish we didn't know about it as the decisions can just drag on now. But there we are. Husbink is doing his best to keep me sane and succeeding some of the time.
Tomorrow night we are going to a murder mystery party and I'm very excited - partly because Husbink hasn't ever done one. We've had much fun putting our costumes together but I'm hoping it is a cold day tomorrow or we may boil! (1930s pilots...)
Sunday, I'm service leading at church...I'm a bit nervous due to my general tendency to cry a lot at the moment...still, it is always good to see a bit of honesty from the front...ahem...
Have a grand weekend all