Sharing personal experiences of giving and receiving health care
Staying Over Our Skates
One winter weekend, I was walking in a local park that has an ice-skating rink. I stopped to watch the skaters for a few minutes. I’m not a skater myself, but I appreciated the skaters’ wide range of ages and abilities.
Off to one side of the rink, I saw a young boy struggling to skate. He was hanging onto one of the walker frames that were provided, his face a mixture of determination, frustration and a hint of fear as he struggled to stay upright and move forward.
Jell-O, Phone Calls and Other Small Stuff
As I reflect on my year of clinical rotations as a medical student, my mind instantly conjures up some of the biggest moments I’ve experienced.
There have been euphoric highs, like delivering a beautiful baby girl to first-time parents on Mother’s Day. And heartbreaking lows, like having a panic attack in the bathroom after a patient with psychosis shared his delusions about race with me.
Living the Dream
The first time I watched a baby being delivered, the world narrowed to the woman in front of me. And the head coming out of her. Followed by a little shoulder, then the other. Then there was a baby in the room. A brand-new human being, seconds old.
The doctor placed the baby on the mom’s chest, and the baby cried—a soft newborn cry, the kind before their lungs develop and it becomes shrill.
I stood in the corner, afraid that if I said or did anything, the magic in the room would disappear. I felt my eyes water, but I couldn’t talk.
More Voices
Every month readers tell their stories — in 40 to 400 words — on a different healthcare theme.
Jan 2022
November 2021
New Voices
Stories by those whose faces and perspectives are underrepresented in media and in the health professions.
“One of Them”
Suzanne Smith was an elderly white woman who experienced a violent assault some odd years ago. Since then, she’d never been quite the same. Plagued by fears and sleepless nights, the concepts of medicine and psychotherapy were alien to her, and from my understanding in speaking to her children prior to her coming in, she wasn’t keen on speaking to medical professionals.
Red Ship
Editor’s Note: As New Voices’ first editor, I am thrilled to launch Pulse’s newest feature with this story by Livja Koka, depicting, among other things, the difficult choices that parents make in hopes of giving their children a better future. This story, we hope, is only the first of many accounts by writers whose voices and experiences have often gone unseen and unheard. If you have such a story to tell, we hope you’ll consider submitting it to New Voices. — Olapeju Simoyan
Every family has things they do not discuss. The emotions are too real,
A New Pulse Feature: New Voices
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Poems
Seated on My Hospital Bed
My seventh-floor window vibrates,
the room throbs in crescendo
as a rescue helicopter stitches
a curved seam across the sky
bound for Children’s Hospital.
Migraine
It’s not the heart that gathers all the pain
of our life, it’s the head;
burning head, cremating all my movements
forcing me to fake that I exist:
Gratitude
When was the last time I combed my hair?
Before the ambulance, even longer
when the plate shattered
and he cleaned it up without speaking.
