With a startle, he woke up. "Ah, yes. I fell asleep waiting for you! It's about time you came! Now, I want to talk to you about getting better." Nodding my head, the words I'd been mulling over for the last 2 hours finally started to take shape. How many different ways do you have to tell someone he's dying before it takes hold? How many times do you have to repeat yourself before the reality of the situation settles in?
You weren't even alive long enough for me to see your face, little one. But I remember every detail. The overhead page for a pediatric rapid response team to the main lobby. Running into the pediatric social worker as I stepped out of the stairwell, casually adopting her stride as we were pointed outside to … Continue reading Why Aren’t You More Resilient?
"Doc, I'm tired of this."
I looked at V's wan face. The vibrance that I adored had been sucked out of her over the last 9 months by chemotherapy and radiation. I remembered the moment she cried in my office, angry I hadn't been the one to tell her that her breast cancer had returned everywhere.
Now she couldn't muster up any emotion - no tears, no anger, no frustration.
Just tired.
As a millennial physician, I grew up in the world of team-based care, evidenced based medicine, and "To Err is Human." I graduated a rigorous, work-hour rule bending residency program that still managed to provide a supportive environment filled with camaraderie.
We celebrated success and newfound skills together. We also suffered, grieved loss and failures - together. The togetherness gave it meaning.
I was eager to join the community of practicing physicians. On the other side of board certification, I found no such community. Rather, I found merely a group physicians in close proximity doing similar tasks, but in pursuit of individual and often disparate goals.
In my search for community, I found myself alone.
Most people in their 20's and 30's assume they're going to wake up tomorrow. They believe they'll get to make good on their plans a few weeks, months and even years from now. Death is a thing that happens to old people, therefore, they have plenty of time to worry about that later.
Not for me. Death is a constant companion of mine. ...