Metaphors & Medicine

Dear 2017, I am overwhelmed by the thought of writing this letter to you. You were a beautiful storm. A very chaotic, beautiful storm. I first greeted you in the buzzing hallways of an Emergency Department, working with one of my favorite physicians of all time. It only took a few minutes for us to meet for you to show me what it meant for people to want to leave you just as quickly as they met you. One suicide attempt after another, they felt close yet so far away. I wished to hold someone's hand and tell them this was just the beginning of something, not the end. You urged me to forget about the "end of 2016" and focus on this new beginning with you. By the time I met you, I had brushed aside the hurt of 2016. I had found balance and learned contentment. I began my journey with you with a newfound trust in Allah, and yet I still had some anxiety about where I would be a few months into our journey. But I was content. I was content. I was content. 2016 had bee...

She was looking up at me with her bead-like deep brown eyes, the rest of her face hidden by the giraffe blanket she refuses to let go of. When I pulled the blanket away from her, she smiled at me, the largest and most beautiful toothless smile I have ever seen. I reached for her my niece, Zaida, and pulled her little chubby 6-month-old self and put her on the floor with her toys around her. I reached my hands toward her, open and facing up, and she reached for them, touching the edges of my hands and my fingers, discovering a small part of the human canvas. She looked up at me through her dark eyelashes and smiled her toothless grin again. In those moments, she steals my mind and makes me think of nothing but her innocent, young, discovering joy. Being home and away from the hectic school life has been bittersweet. I have loved waking up to the aroma of freshly brewed coffee, cherished sipping my morning coffee with Mama I have cherished the late night chats with Baba as we go ove...

"Resilience," the dean of admissions said to me, her eyes making deep contact with mine, as though she silently understood the lifeline I was desperately in need of. "The best medical students I have known are resilient. They endure the challenges of medical school, the setbacks, the failures, and they remain determined to succeed. They face their weaknesses and do all that they can, reach out to peers, reach out to us, and they do not give up. It is not about their smarts; it is about their resilience." This conversation took place nearly a year ago in the midst of interview season. At the time, I thought of my circumstances and wondered if that made me resilient. There I was undergoing this process for a second time because I was determined to get accepted. I could see the physician I was building myself to be and I just needed to get over this huge hurdle to get closer and closer to that goal. Surely, that was resilience. Surely, that was what she meant. I...

I was laughing. A friend said a joke, and the rest of us laughed. We were at the point where all the little, silly things seemed funnier than they actually were. Studying for hours and thinking about what you need to study takes up a lot more brain power than expected. It puts you in this almost “loopy” state of mind, where a simple joke becomes something much larger and leads to tears flowing down your face. We were still smiling as we found a study room to get comfortable in, plugged in our devices, took our papers, began mentally formulating a plan of what to tackle first. I mindlessly clicked on one of my social media pages and let it load as I took out my highlighters. When I looked down at my phone, time stopped. Home. Conversation became faint background noise. Home. Another headline leaving my head spinning. Another reminder of the life I live that feels so separate from the rest of the world. In situations like this, I feel so separate and so divided all...