Metaphors & Medicine

  I set a goal to be present, to simply be, to find myself in the midst of patient stories in OR’s or packed patient rooms. What I ended up finding was that in the silence of the rest of the world, while I am away from my commitments and all the things I “have” to do, all the people I “have” to be, I am able to hear and feel exactly what I want. The last week that I spent working 8-14 hours a day turned out to be the most life-changing period of my life. There’s something that happens to you when you are away in a different world, and being in that hospital everyday felt that way. The drive into the city each and everyday renewed my intention to serve a place away from my own, to strive to make this new place a home in a way that would make me love its people without knowing them. When you are on your own, you find connections with the people you are experiencing this other world with for they will always be the ones who understand exactly what this experience was like for all of ...

  “They’re arriving in 3 hours. Be ready to meet them and get their story,” the social worker told me. They had waited for weeks to get permission to leave Gaza and come to be seen by the visiting surgeons. They finally got permission two days after the day of screening, but they were coming and that was all that mattered. Three hours later, I received a call declaring their arrival and went looking for a little boy and his mother outside of the OR. As I looked around, a little boy peeked our from behind a woman seated to my right, and smiled the biggest smile, his beautiful big eyes decorated with his long lashes. “ Are you from Gaza?” I asked the woman he was hiding behind. “Yes! " She said. "This is my son.” I sat next to her, reached out my hand to hold his little one, and once again he smiled. Their story was a long one, one laced with medical troubles over his short life and restrictions designed by occupation. But they were here. His surgery was the longest I had ever...

The air is crisp and blows in our faces in preparation for yet another day. Each day brings with it its own share of challenges and often pleasant surprises. I find myself using the hour commute in the morning to reflect and center myself, remember to be present, focus on why I am here, and most importantly, remind myself of all the planning and work that had to be done to embark on this trip, to even have these experiences, to even be sitting in this bumpy commute, driving past mountain, village, settlement, mountain. Each day, I’ve watched the surgeons and anesthesiologist have to become creative and make up for a missing instrument or tool that would normally be readily available in the states. This is no easy job for them, and I call them nothing short of superheroes. They’ve come to Palestine where their resilience in the OR fits in easily with the resilience of the patients and their families. It is a common connection between them, the determination to face the challenges of the...

 “What’s your name, habibi ?” I asked our next little patient. His eyes peered up at me through his eyelashes, and I could tell that he was not shy but rather taking in the moving and bustling figures around him, trying to figure out who to trust. A clever one, and a kind one, with eyes that smiled before his lips did. “ Do you want to have a competition?” I asked. He leaned his head to the side, then nodded slowly. He was seated in a wheelchair waiting for his turn to be out on the OR table. I returned to him with a bottle of water for making bubbles, and immediately became excited. “I want you to blow as hard as you can, okay? Let’s see who can make more bubbles, me or you.” And he blew. Initially, they were small, only one or two bubbles. A few minutes later, he was blowing 10 bubbles or more each time. We all cheered, and his shoulders relaxed, his smile became bigger, and he blew harder each time, and each time was met with our cheers. . Not every problem can be settled like h...

O ne of the dearest humans to me wrote me a letter before I left the U.S., told me to tuck it in my bag and not forget it. “You can only read it on the plane,” she said firmly. I am going to refer to this letter often along this trip because it was exactly what I needed to read upon beginning this journey. So as I am reflecting on my day today and what tomorrow will be, I can’t help but think of a sentence in her letter. She wrote, “This trip is just another line on the fingerprint of your life...except this time it’s a little different. It’s always a little different, and each time it’s a little deeper.” I woke up to the sound of the call for prayer from the mosque’s loud speaker, echoing in the valley of the city. I watched the sunrise in the city this morning, heard the birds greet its residents. I kissed my grandmother’s hand, sipped my grandfather’s mint tea, and kept correcting my uncles as they repeatedly called me and greeted me as “doctor.” I thanked Allah for another visit, a...