fostering the humanistic practice of medicine publishing personal accounts of illness and healing encouraging health care advocacy

SubscribeEnergizeOR
Facebook Instagram Tiktok Bluesky

fostering the humanistic practice of medicine publishing personal accounts of illness and healing encouraging health care advocacy

SubscribeEnergizeOR
Facebook Instagram Tiktok Bluesky

Stories

Her Call Was Tougher Than Mine

12 Comments / Stories /

“Is he in pain?” Joshua’s mother asked, after I told her who I was. She had finally answered the phone after fifteen days of letting my calls go to voicemail.

“I don’t think so,” I answered. The truth was, at that point in my early career as a pediatric resident, I didn’t know whether he was in pain. “We’re giving him medicines to keep him comfortable.”

“Okay,” she said. I could hear young children laughing in the background. I knew from her obstetric records that she had five besides this newborn.

“Any questions?” I asked.

Her Call Was Tougher Than Mine Read More »

Next of Kin

2 Comments / Stories /

Editor’s Note: This piece was a finalist in the Pulse writing contest, “On Being Different.”

The Early Nineties

A number of things happened the moment I realized I was gay. From the moment I came out to myself and to those around me, I felt the scales fall from my eyes. The sky was brighter, the air crisper. I felt free, excited by the world and all it had to offer.

How could it have taken forty-four years to work this out? I kept asking myself.

Next of Kin Read More »

The Dreams That Bring Us Here

14 Comments / Stories /

It is a quiet Thursday evening in the fall of 2015 at the Dara Medical Center in Brooklyn, where I’m volunteering as a medical observer. The Center is almost empty. At the far end of the corridor, I see an elderly man wearing a black sweater and eyeglasses. His face is pale; his eyes and hands are creased and wrinkled.

“Where are you from?” he asks.

“I’m Palestinian,” I answer.

“Pakistan?” he replies incredulously.

The Dreams That Bring Us Here Read More »

New Normal

4 Comments / Stories /

Editor’s Note: This piece was a finalist in the Pulse writing contest, “On Being Different.”

When I finally got to take my newborn son home, after an almost six-week stay in the NICU, the social worker said, “You will be his advocate. You will know him better than anyone. And you will find your new normal.”

My son’s diagnosis was that he would never walk or talk. After his brain MRI, I felt that the hospital staff looked at us differently. My son’s life—and, by extension, our lives—would be different.

New Normal Read More »

Myrtle Beach

5 Comments / Stories /

Babies are not made of plastic.

In both their distribution of mass and their texture, the feel is utterly different. Babies are warm and soft and plump and pink. Their heads are bowling balls.

New mothers are uncomfortably aware of this fact, as I’ve observed many times in my role as a pediatrician.

Myrtle Beach Read More »

A Different Shade of Black

4 Comments / Stories /

Editor’s Note: This piece was a finalist in the Pulse writing contest, “On Being Different.”

Ask any medical student what makes them unique among their peers, and you’ll almost certainly be treated to a two-minute answer that’s been rehearsed in countless mock interviews and essays as part of their preparations for residency applications.

It’s ingrained in the collective medical-student brain that to be recognized, we must stand out–constantly looking for opportunities to demonstrate our unparalleled competence.

A Different Shade of Black Read More »

The Battle of Britain

3 Comments / Stories /

It was winter, and I’d been seeing Raymond in his home for occupational therapy for more than a month. The home health agency physician’s orders had been to evaluate and treat him for home safety, and I was working closely with the nurse and social worker from the same agency.

Unfortunately, the social worker and the nurse were at odds over the need for Raymond to move into a nursing home.

The facts were stacked against him.

The Battle of Britain Read More »

I Can’t See Pictures in My Head

11 Comments / Stories /

Editor’s Note: This piece was a finalist in the Pulse writing contest, “On Being Different.”

Visual imagination is like a superpower or a sixth sense: We take it for granted. On demand, we conjure up images of those we hold most dear: family, friends, our beloved pets. We envision people, places and things that we’d like to experience in the future. We revisit cherished memories simply by picturing them, essentially reliving them, all in our mind’s eye.

That is, unless you have aphantasia—like me.

I Can’t See Pictures in My Head Read More »

The Dining-Room Caper

6 Comments / Stories /

After fifteen years as a physical therapist in the long-term care industry, I’d vowed never again to get overly attached to a resident. Although I accepted my patients’ inevitable physical and cognitive declines, the deaths of those I had cherished took too much of an emotional toll: It felt like losing a grandparent, repeatedly.

Then William entered our facility.

The Dining-Room Caper Read More »

The Difference

6 Comments / Stories /

My patients do not speak. Or rather, my patients do not speak using words. Instead, they have taught me the art of body language—of noises, expressions and postures.

I read the movement of ears, the way pupils dilate or constrict. Watch for the tremors, for the hunch of a spine, for the described bows or stretches that could indicate abdominal spasm. Search for the hint of a leg being favored, for the inaudible signs of pain. Wait for tongues darting over lips. Offer food that may be sniffed at or turned away from. I’ve learned to respond to fear with gentleness, to preempt the sharpness of tooth or claw with slow movements.

The Difference Read More »

Happiness Loves Company

4 Comments / Stories /

I remember the first time I saw the gates of the Missionaries of Charity home for the destitute and dying, on the outskirts of my hometown, Pune, in western India.

I must have been nine or ten. To my annoyance, my parents had woken me early that Sunday morning to go with them to visit the home and bring donations of clothes and other necessities.

“How much longer, Papa?” I kept asking as we drove.

Happiness Loves Company Read More »

What’s Wrong With You?

5 Comments / Stories /

Editor’s Note: This piece was awarded an honorable mention in the Pulse writing contest, “On Being Different.”

“What’s wrong with you?”

The words cut through my mind and hit me in the gut. My fragile fifteen-year-old ego splintered like a glass cup slipping through fingers onto hardwood.

Tears welled up, and my lips pursed, ready to respond. But I couldn’t find the words—for in that moment, I truly knew that I was broken, I was ugly, I was wrong. And even my mother knew it.

What’s Wrong With You? Read More »

© 2024 Pulse - Voices from the Heart of Medicine, Inc. All rights reserved.

Website Design & Development by New York Design Studio, LLC

Start typing and press enter to search

Scroll to Top

Subscribe to Pulse.

It's free.

Facebook Instagram Tiktok Bluesky
GIVE THE GIFT OF PULSEGiveTHE GIFT OF Pulse