Precariousness
Being a physician grapples with the extremes of life:
euphoric triumphs and crushing defeats, both joy and prolonged suffering,
generosity and selfishness, birth and death. Practicing medicine can soften a
soul to be more human and compassionate or harden someone to be jaded and
disconnected.
Frankly, being a physician sucks.
You sacrifice
your youth on the altar of medicine; I missed my wife’s graduation from her
Masters program for a medical student surgical rotation.
A sense of inadequacy
and imposter syndrome hangs over everything; my long time patient has one visit
with another physician and they make an obvious and life altering diagnosis.
Societal and
social pressures are awkward and embarrassing; I routinely try to hide my profession
when meeting people for the first time.
Suffering becomes
routine; I had to tell a 21 year old man that the mass in his neck he was
ignoring was cancer.
Taking the blame
for suffering is something you volunteer for; ‘Why would I ever let you vaccinate
my child? Do you just want to give them autism?’
Helplessness is a
constant companion; pregnant women return to their substance abuse and the men
who give them orbital fractures.
Randomness is
your worst enemy; I was the one who discovered an unborn baby, dead at term,
when only 3 days ago it was alive when Mom decided to delay an elective
induction.
Normal life is
ripped from you by a sense of professional obligation; I had to meet my next
door neighbors for the first time in the ER, then watch as their mother’s
mucous membranes sloughed off and she died leaving a broken and dysfunctional
family.
Dude, being a doctor is awesome!
People trust you
enough to share their most subtle achievements; my patient just cut back from
smoking a cigarette every 30 minutes to every 45 minutes!
New life dawning
on the world is something you can participate in; I have the fortune of
facilitating the making of a perfect family even more whole.
Physical and
emotional suffering are treatable; my palliative care patient physically relaxes
once the pain is adequately treated which literally changes the trajectory of
an entire family rocked by grief and loss.
The brightest
minds around collaborate on the
toughest problems; I am routinely both challenged and educated by my peers, on
both medicine, social, and personal issues.
Watching children grow is like
absolutely nothing else; delivering a child and then caring for them over years
is having the honor of joining in on the molding of a new spirit.
Passing on a
legacy of compassion to the future is a humbling responsibility; fostering the
bright spark in a medical student’s heart and teaching them how to protect that
in a broken system may be the biggest impact I ever make.
When the
oppressed rise above their circumstances, you are there to give a hand; my OB
patient had nothing, no support from family or the father, she was addicted to
drugs, and by sheer force of will she built the best circumstances this child
could hope for.
A pedestal to
fight for justice is easy to find; the societal clout afforded physicians gives
us the opportunity to correct injustice for both our own patients and in the
systems affecting our communities.
Donning the white coat, you are exposed to and shaped by the
worst in yourself and others. But implicit with the honor of caring for others
is the potential to witness and share in love, sacrifice, joy, victory over
impossible situations, and all the best that humanity has to offer.
