Sharing personal experiences of giving and receiving health care A premier narrative medicine and medical humanities resource
Sharing personal experiences of
giving and receiving health care
A premier narrative medicine
& medical humanities resource
During the month of October — Pulse is accepting Haiku submissions.
After the Fall: What Happened Next
I live in a small town on the River Tay in Eastern Ontario. One day, I was exercising at the gym with my husband, Yogi.
I’d just finished my first leg-machine exercise. As I reached for the grungy logbook, the floor suddenly reeled out from under me.
Am I fainting?
I lurched to sit down.
“It’s okay, I’m fine!” I assured those around me. But my sudden disorientation screamed that I was not.
Wounded Souls, a Broken System and Me
I became a psychologist because I wanted to be a healer.
At twenty-five, I believed I could save lives through therapy alone—reach into the chaos of psychosis, pull people back with presence and insight and bring them home to themselves. Not with medication. Not with systems. Just one mind in conversation with another. I’d read the stories—Frieda Fromm-Reichmann, Harold Searles, Otto Will. I believed in that kind of power.
Thirty years later, in 1998, I emerged from a Christmas party on Lafayette Street, blinking in the cold, the voices of managed-care executives echoing in my ears.
“Hello, It’s Your Electronic Medical Record Calling”
I’m sitting in the waiting room at my hematologist’s office. Today is bone-marrow biopsy day—the day a drill will penetrate my hip bone to extract a sample.
The road to this moment began several months ago with a routine blood test at my annual exam. The test showed an abnormally high count for one type of blood cell. I was referred to a hematologist for further evaluation. The referral surprised me, but I wasn’t worried—yet.
I endured several more tests to rule out some conditions; however, my hematologist, Dr. Fawcett, has suggested that we move forward with the bone-marrow biopsy to get the full picture.
More Voices
Every month readers tell their stories — in 40 to 400 words — on a different healthcare theme.
Disability
October 2025
The Exam Room
September 2025
Awaiting a Diagnosis
August 2025
New Voices
Stories by those whose faces and perspectives are underrepresented in media and in the health professions.
The Distance Between
I was in secondary school in Nigeria when I first noticed the lesion on Uncle Eze’s lip. Like many men of his age in Lagos, he’d picked up smoking in the 1980s, when foreign cigarette companies flooded our markets with glossy advertisements and promises of sophistication. The habit stuck, even as the glamour faded. The streets of Lagos were dotted with tobacco vendors then, selling single sticks to businessmen who’d made cigarettes part of their daily routine.
“It’s nothing,” he said, when I pointed to the growing sore. In those days, seeing a dermatologist meant traveling to one of the few teaching hospitals in the country. Uncle Eze, my mother’s eldest brother and the owner of a thriving electronics shop, had his business to run, customers to meet. The lesion could wait.
“Teach to Fish for Tomorrow”
It’s a typical Friday night in New Orleans. The streets are brimming with people from all over the world looking for a night of fun in the Big Easy.
I check the time: 5:45 pm. It’s a little more than a mile from my apartment to Ozanam Inn, a shelter for the unhoused where I work as the coordinator for the student-run Tulane Tuberculosis Screening Clinic Program. My shift tonight runs from 6:00-8:00 pm.
A Different Kind of Different
Editor’s Note: This piece was a finalist in the Pulse writing contest, “On Being Different.”
Every parent likes to think their child is one in a million. What if you’re the parent of an individual who is more like one in 326 million?
Society in general has started to be more cognizant of disabilities—some disabilities more than others. For instance, Down syndrome awareness and acceptance has excelled in the past several years, and schools have made efforts to teach inclusion and acceptance of students with special needs.
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Poems
Lessons From the Night Sky
It has recently come to your attention that asteroid 2022 AP7 is headed towards the earth. ◙ Despite your attempts at distraction, your mind repeatedly imagines the collision. ◙ Experts call 2022 AP7 a planet killer–then say not to worry as it could be many generations before this is a true concern.
Infinite Excuses
A long day makes me want to get home, and I’ll have
to explain, again, why I’m late to pick up the kids. The merge
onto the Expressway slows. At least the drivers stay patient,
taking turns. We keep stuttering forward until I see the cause
of our delay–two cars against the median, front and sides
crumpled metal. Next to them sits a white, windowless van.
Three Needles
First the catheter, slimmest filament,
slid in by expert hands
The next needle delivers
a pillowy somnolence
your russet-furred rabbit face falling
gently into my cradling palm
Then the final dose,
doctor calculated for your now boney, bunny frame
