This week a member of my (very) immediate family is in hospital for serious surgery. I’ve been to the hospital I think 7 or 8 times this week and each time I can’t escape or avoid how much I can’t stand being there. The coldness, the sterility, the juxtaposition between the joy of new life and the pain of the end of life all taking place under the same roof. It doesn’t matter how many times I go, the uneasiness never ends. The place makes me sick.
As I went to visit my family member, I was in the same room as I was in one of the last times I ever saw my grandmother alive. A couple of floors away was the room where I was born. My mind was racing. The person I was there to visit was asleep and I was alone with constant beeping and buzzing machines, squiggly lines and my own thoughts.
I couldn’t comprehend the mentality of the doctors and nurses. These people live every day in circumstances that ordinary people dread. Every day of their working life is spent in crucial, life-threatening situations and it left me to wonder; do they care? I mean I know they do care, but how can they REALLY care when they see this every day? I don’t care about everything that happens at work, I don’t care about everything I do even when I’m doing the things I love, and these people are working 16 hour shifts. I know I thought this because I projected my own cynicism onto these people and assumed they had the same shortcomings as I do. But they aren’t cynical, they of all people can’t be, and the most amazing thing about it to me is that they ARE ordinary people.
Sometimes it takes for you to be put into a situation you would rather not be in to realise something that you should have known all along. I might have a bad day at work but they see people they have got to know die at work. I might have a headache but someone who’s raised me is having potentially life threatening surgery, and the recovery is WORSE. My problems are nothing. I have no right to complain. I feel ridiculous and selfish for ever doing so.
But through all the uncertainty, realisations and waiting you come out of it with a better understanding. You understand that despite everything you do in your life and every precaution you take, your life is ultimately in the hands of people or circumstances beyond you. All you can do is give it your best, make the most of your opportunities and never drift away from the ones you are close to. It took a scare to remind me.
My dad is recovering well.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
True words man.
ReplyDeleteI can't stand hospitals either, especially RAH... I've spent what would add up to months in that place, always for negative reasons. Even going near the place gives me chills now.
Through my personal experiences I became very jaded with the medical profession. Not all but many of the doctors and nurses I came across made me realise they view their patients like a person in retail views their customers. With that said, a select few really put their heart into their work and dealt with patients/their fam amazingly.
I guess it just mirrors life in general... a world full of shit people but with great ones amongst them that give you faith and the will to move from day to day.
Good to hear it went well for your dad, that's the main thing.
Thanks man. This has probably been one of the better experiences I've had in a hopsital, it just brought all that shit into the spotlight again.
ReplyDeleteGood points and well made. The everyday worries of living seem completely trivial compared to something serious, such as life. Such IS life, in fact. One should make the most of it. No regrets.
ReplyDelete