Metaphors & Medicine

I have been away from the blog for some time...I know. Sometimes you need a minute.  I just recently finished interviewing for this cycle of medical school applications. No, I have not made a final decision.  Sometimes if you want something bad enough, your patience will be continuously tested to see if you truly want it bad enough. Don't get me wrong, alhamdulillah I have been blessed in more ways than one during this cycle.  But I have grown in ways I was not prepared for. I have written briefly in the past about how much I struggled mentally and emotionally while applying this past summer, and how that made the summer one of the hardest times for me to look back at.  I have been terrified  of going back to how I felt then. That fear is one of the reasons that I have dedicated myself to working harder on myself  than ever before. The simple act of being able to climb out of bed without a list of reasons why I should is ...

"Make sure to drive within the lines on your way to your house," my brother said to me. No, this was not one of my driver's ed lessons. One of my favorite memories involves a big rug that my brother and I used to have, which had streets, houses, and even a race car track all drawn on the rug. We used to collect small cars, Hot Wheel cars amongst others, and named them so we could tell them apart. When we got the rug, it was like our favorite toys finally had a home. The cars spoke to each other, they drove to their homes and "napped," and most importantly they had friendly races in the track. At the time, the biggest challenge seemed to be to drive the cars within the lines drawn on the rug in soft fabric. There were no distractions or external factors that should make it difficult to stay within the lines unless we wanted to move the cars quickly. And yet, it was still difficult, with the car's control within our fingertips, to keep them moving at a ...

They say you know the people who love you most by who is around you while you are dying. A "Code Blue" was called again today, a cardiac alert, a sign that the patient that was coming in to the ER was in respiratory distress and their heart stopped at some point. I assumed position as usual, pulled out a fresh sheet of paper for documenting the long code that was about to ensue, and followed the physician into the room to wait for the patient. I assumed my usual position at the back of the room, and my mind began to tune out the rest of my thoughts and leave them outside of the room. The few minutes before an ambulance arrives are what I like to call a "quick hustle." Staff are moving around the room to gather equipment and necessary medications, EKG's are being given to the physician, various staff members are coming in and out of the room, and yet there is this hovering silence, the calm before the storm, the rush and nerves of the uncertainty of what i...