Wednesday, September 20, 2006 at 10:05 pm (Just An Update)
Today marks the first time I ate a plate full of french fries in about three years. It tasted great.
It also marks the end of one week of severe PMS – the whole shabang of bloating, aching, depression, constipation, endless hunger, inability to concentrate, being mean to people, and general blegh-ness…. finally came to an end.
It’s also the day that I went back to meet my dear 22-year-old boy after a whole week. It’s simply amazing…one moment a person’s breathing through a tube down his throat, totally sedated, surviving on the basis of chemicals and fluids going in through lines that go into so many parts of his body – all this just one week ago, and now today I see him sitting up in bed quietly eating fruit loops and eggs for breakfast. I wanted to tell him that he looked like a tired baby squirrel who had just come out of a whole winter’s hibernation and was now slowly eating his first meal in Spring.
Today also marks the day before my five days of hibernation – ie living/eating/sleeping in my room coz nothing/no one else matters till Tuesday is over. Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday. TUESDAY.
So here goes! See you next week folks! Thanks for all the comments – I will definitely reply when I resurface. In the meantime, HAVE A GREAT WEEK!!
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Friday, September 15, 2006 at 11:13 pm (A Bolt of Insight, Defining Life, Just Do It!)
I’ve decided.
Soon after this exam, I’m going to get a tatoo. It’ll be a beautiful colorful butterfly at the top of my right arm.
Why?
Just because…
Just because we only live this life once.
And because butterflies remind me of how beautiful life is.
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Tuesday, September 12, 2006 at 10:20 pm (Defining Life, Sniff sniff)
It wasn’t a surprise to see her sitting by his bed all day today, even though he wasn’t awake. Fast asleep with a tube in his mouth and IV lines going into every vein they could find. She didn’t get up even once, and it was only a while after walking away that it really struck me why.
She wanted to hear him breathe. And breathe again. And then again. Because somehow she knew that soon his doctor would come to her and explain that now even if he made it through the next few days, after that it wasn’t about years anymore, it was more on the scale of weeks, and in the tiny chance that things went well, maybe a few months. That his cancer was suddenly growing back and winning against us and we couldn’t try our miracle drug anymore because that might’ve been what made him this sick in the first place.
The son that you raised and played with and laughed with and fed and clothed and hugged and kissed and dropped off to school and for twenty-two years you dreamt dreams of his bright future…. and now his breaths are so limited that you’re listening closely to each one because you never want to forget the sound of him breathing. You don’t want to hear anyone talk, you don’t want sympathy, you don’t care about food or sleep, you just want to be with him and listen to him breathe because each breath counts right now as the sand runs through the hour glass and his numbers keep flashing on a dark computer screen.
Don’t die. Please don’t die, don’t you see, you’re only twenty-two and you’re such a nice person and you’re supposed to be driving around in the new car that your mom bought you and playing with your four dogs and going to college and falling in love and deciding what you want to be in life. Don’t die because you’re the only person your mom has in her life, and what is she going to do once you’re gone – where is she going to start again, how is she going to pick up the pieces of her life when you’re all she’s cared about for the past twenty two years?
Don’t die because just two days ago you were sitting on the couch in your hospital room, gingerly sipping on orange juice as though it was a martini, laughing heartily at the lame jokes your doctor was cracking – and that made us so hopeful, we thought you’d be ok now and that we’d won the battle against a rare cancer that only five people had been treated for in the history of the world, and that it was just a matter of days before you regained your strength and then you’d be going back home with your mom.
You’re a life – a beautiful life that just started and was only supposed to keep getting better with each day. If only you knew how much definition you bring to the word life – indeed, you are life.
Then why are you dying?
Don’t die. Please don’t die.
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Sunday, September 10, 2006 at 8:53 pm (Sunshine & Rain, Whatever...)
I believe that true love does happen. I believe that even if we haven’t found him/her yet, we still have to continue to believe that somewhere on this planet there is someone right for each one of us.
For a while now I’ve had a crush on this guy in my program. He’s pretty much everything I’ve ever wanted in a guy – we share the same beliefs (like down the whole vegetarian deal and all), cultures, origins, career paths, and ambitions. The nice part is that despite having so much in common, we still have a lot of new viewpoints and experiences to share. We get along really well and somehow destiny made it such that we both decided to take a year off med school this year and ended up not only in the same program, but also living in the same building, same floor, next-door neighbours.
When you bump into someone who you think is so perfectly right for you, sometimes it throws you back – like “Huh? You do exist after all – it wasn’t just something I was falsely reassuring myself of all these years. All the times I was trying to make other people seem right, there you were, miles away, leading your own life… and then one day you walked into mine.”
But in the real world there’s no such thing as perfect - and he was yet another reminder of that fact. He already has someone in his life. He met her four months ago and he’s crazy about her. I guess in spite of everything then, he wasn’t right for me after all. And so gradually I get over this silly crush and I let go of how right I thought he was.
Which takes me back to my initial point. That even if we haven’t found him/her yet, we still have to continue to believe that somewhere on this planet there is someone right for each one of us.
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Tuesday, September 5, 2006 at 9:53 pm (A Bolt of Insight, Just Do It!)
Today as we talked to a pediatric oncology patient, my thoughts drifted faraway…
Imagine if the positions were reversed and I was lying in this frail 22-year-old’s bed in his place, with him standing above me with a team of doctors. Imagine if I was the one feeling feverish, nauseated, and in pain, with bleeding gums and diarrhea. Imagine if I were the one who was told that I had anaplastic large cell lymphoma for the third time over and that all we could do was hope that this new treatment would work. Imagine if I was the one looking up at him from that bed, with silent eyes that were begging him to find some way to make me feel better.
“You’re so healthy,” I would think, as I lie there looking at him standing in his shining white coat. “You’re so very healthy and I hope you really do cherish that. I hope you work hard to achieve your goals in life and I hope that every dream you’ve ever dreamt comes true for you. Did you say that you once dreamt of reducing the suffering and pain of others, of healing the ill, of giving hope to those who have no hope? Well then I hope you use every ounce of good health that you have in you to do it. Because that’s what life is – the celebration of people doing good things for each other. I can’t do anything for you now – look at how little I can do for myself! But I can let you know that I’m counting on you. We’re all counting on you actually – you have the energy, the means, the ambition to do something special for us. So then what are you waiting for, what are you wasting time for? The path is laid out and there are lights all along the way. Each step of the way has been spelt out for you and there are people cheering you on at the sidelines. Then really, what are you waiting for? Time’s running out, don’t you see that? Just do it!”
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