Contributing Writer
University of Oklahoma College of Medicine
Medical student with aspirations for music, art, and mankind.
There is a white ball of yarn that rests on the chair beside me. I drag the free end, extend the thread and wrap it around the knitting needle to begin my stitch. I think I’ll try to make a scarf until my husband tries to speak again.
This beating heart / Gave me a second start / It gave me a reason to be / To be me
The beginning of third year clerkships is an exciting time for medical students. The first step of my licensing exam was finally behind me and now I could focus on applying the knowledge into a clinical context. I had heard a lot of stories about the third year of medical school. Perhaps what stood out most were the reflections shared with me when people witnessed death for the first time. From full codes to hospice patients, something about death seemed to draw out the most intense emotions and thoughts that can change lives forever. Although I always try to do the best for my patients, I knew it was inevitable that I would come across death. I wondered what profound thoughts and reflections I would have when I experienced it for the first time. It wasn’t too long before I was called to do CPR in the emergency department and I found it did not play out as I expected.
They’re out of place in dirty Crocs and wrinkled sweatpants. More notably, she’s wiping tears from puffy cheeks. It’s a sharp contrast to the nurses, who are too casual. One makes a remark to the other about a tangled tube. They always get that way. The other chuckles.
Like many bibliophiles, I keep a running list of books “To Read”, and I have a complicated system for deciding what I will read next; because of this, any new recommendation must go to the end of the queue. Every now and then, though, a book comes along that disrupts my whole system. In this case, I read an excerpt in The New Yorker that moved me: I was struck by the clarity of the writing and finished the excerpt wanting to know more. Over the next week, three different people recommended it and I began seeing it everywhere. Sensing that this book was something important, I bought and immediately began reading When Breath Becomes Air by Dr. Paul Kalanithi.
One after the other, day after day it seems, I find myself in a room where the resident is breaking the news of terminal cancer to my patients and I feel an overwhelming sadness belied by numbness. It has only been a week and a half on internal medicine and we have already diagnosed three unsuspecting patients with cancer.
Normally I’m itching / hustling / to be involved in a delivery.
I climbed into bed on October 11 excited: for the first time in years, I could pinpoint what I was feeling — I was happy. Pure, simple happiness, something that had eluded me for years in the throes of depression and anxiety as a teenager, was a feeling I could recognize again. Wow, I thought, maybe this will be my year.
Although there is really never a right time to die or even witness death, it is important to acknowledge that death is a reality, and one to which all health care practitioners will be subjected at some point in time. For that reason, I raise the question: is there an appropriate time to lose a patient? From my perspective the answer is yes, and for good reason.
Young eyes awake to a febrile surprise / amid a quake of jittering limbs, / a clonic fit whose master cried / and shook the serenity of his crib.
What have I done with my life? / The lightning lighting up / the hospital room floor. / Why did I have to die?
Today was my most challenging day of clinical work yet, but it had nothing to do with charting, the number of patients, or the attending on shift. Instead, today was about experiencing humanity and embracing the emotion of caring for others in their most trying moments. As a third-year medical student on my second rotation, I have not lost a patient, seen a code, or experienced serious trauma. I have not had to cope with loss yet. I recognize my innocence and realize that it must change eventually. That process began today.
Contributing Writer
University of Washington School of Medicine
I am a third year medical student at the University of Washington. I grew up near Boise, ID, where I now live with my wife. We met at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, WA, where I graduated with a degree in Sociology and minors in Biology and Chemistry. After graduating in 2017, I plan to pursue a career in family medicine and someday practice in a small town in the Northwest. In my "real life", I enjoy spending time with friends and family and exploring outdoors as a skier, runner, hiker, and mountain biker.
