Editor’s Note: This piece was awarded an honorable mention in the Pulse writing contest, “On Being Different.”
“Don’t leave menus in the apartments!” a voice called sternly as I stood by the elevators in the building where I live.
The speaker was a substitute doorman I’d never seen before. I was holding a plastic bag typically associated with Chinese takeout food, and I realized that he assumed I was there to deliver meals to weary or sedentary New Yorkers.
A variation of this scene took place another time with a different doorman. On both occasions, I played the model minority and made no fuss. But afterwards, I found myself reflecting on these events and what they signified.
Was it my appearance—a skinny Asian male wearing a T-shirt and carrying the telltale red plastic bag—that made me the object of social profiling? For a while afterwards, I felt reluctant to carry a plastic bag when entering a doorman building.
Looking back on my nearly two decades as a critical-care nurse in New York City, I reflected that this must be how my patients feel when they’ve suffered from ethnic profiling—an offense that even well-meaning healthcare workers can commit, as I know from personal experience.
A few years back, while visiting a friend who’d been hospitalized for multiple morbidities and ensuing dementia, I heard someone calling my friend’s name. The curtain slid open to reveal a tall Black man in scrubs, fiddling with what looked like a to-do list.
I straightened up, introduced myself and my friend and asked, “Are you taking him for a procedure?”
In the split second before the man answered, I realized that I’d blundered.
“No, I’m the orthopedic surgical resident,” he said. “I’m here to do a consult.”
I’m not sure if I actually saw hurt in his eyes, or if I only imagined it. In any case, feeling ashamed, I silently reproached myself: Why did I assume that he was a transporter? Was it because he was Black? Clearly, the indignities I’d experienced as a minority hadn’t immunized me against committing race-based microaggressions of my own.
I felt sad and contrite, but also took comfort in the fact that health care, a transformative science and a virtuous art, gives us chances to make things right, whether at the bedside or beyond. I immediately addressed the resident as “Doctor,” and concluded my side of the conversation with, “Thank you so much, Doc!”
I have been asked whether, as a male nurse, I’ve ever felt that I was treated differently (discriminated against for my gender) by patients. Luckily, that has never happened. However, I remember two patients who did react to me based on other perceived differences.
When I was an orientee, at twenty-two, a patient asked to have another nurse because he thought I looked “too young”—a polite way of saying that I didn’t radiate clinical confidence.
In truth, I was a novice: to be exact, a precariously underweight novice nurse who spoke with a foreign accent and suffered a deeply ingrained fear of harming a patient. I felt disappointed that the patient didn’t trust me, and I also feared that I might have unknowingly confirmed the stereotypes about young people being ignorant, mistake-prone and not to be depended on with patient care.
Another time, as a nursing student and I approached a bedside, I heard the patient mutter contemptuously, “I have a broken arm, and two gay guys just walked in; I’m screwed.”
Caught off guard, I didn’t know how to respond—and I dared not imagine what my eyes conveyed when our gazes met.
Later, I pondered how many layers of cultural values, beliefs and communication styles can come into play during patient-provider interactions. In an effort to understand this patient better, I tried to reason out what factors might have shaped his thinking and sentiments—but it was hard. I also wondered what I should do if something like this should happen again: Dealing with it would call for every bit of emotional intelligence I possessed.
For a short while after this incident, I felt a need to “cover” (act more straight) in front of patients. But eventually, feeling robbed of my authentic self, I resumed my natural behavior—and realized, to my relief, that in being my authentic self I could also flourish as a nurse.
I also came away from these episodes feeling even more convinced of the value of compassion—of giving ourselves and others grace in the moments when we, or they, have wronged someone simply because they look different from us.
One of my favorite books is Carlos Bulosan’s 1946 America Is In the Heart, a personal history about navigating the process of acculturation without losing yourself. I related to the author’s experiences, not because I’ve endured the same sufferings but because his narrative enabled me to commune with Filipino immigrants whose experiences inform my view of what it means to be different.
Here is my favorite passage from Bulosan’s book:
“It is but fair to say that America is not a land of one race or one class of men. We are all Americans that have toiled and suffered and known oppression and defeat, from the first Indian that offered peace in Manhattan to the last Filipino pea pickers. America is not bound by geographical latitudes. America is not merely a land or an institution. America is in the hearts of men that died for freedom; it is also in the eyes of men that are building a new world.”
Disregarding the male-centric perspective of Bulosan’s words, I personally interpret them to mean that being different means harnessing my lived experiences, making sense of lessons of the past and being open to rediscovering new meanings in the present. Among other things, for me this means mustering up the courage to own my personal biases. I see this is a necessary part of my commitment to do well by my patients and colleagues.
And by bringing my true self, and my differences, to my work, I am enriching our interactions and helping to make humanism a daily reality in health care.
6 thoughts on “Checking Our Assumptions”
Life is all about acceptance—of self and others. If only such acceptance defined our world!
lsvlab
Appreciate the essay, but would like to add that the assumption that a transporter is “less than” a resident is a problem itself.
Professor Lim, continue to be yourself; that is all any of us can do as Americans and as health professionals. The promise of our country does not exclude having to deal with the ignorance of others or the struggles inherent in freedom such as ours. Yours is an inspiring story and an example of a life well lived; share that with your patients, students, and colleagues.
Excellent story. We stereotype so easily.
I love this essay. Fedilindo has the big mind set that allows us to gently see ourselves as perpetrators and recipients of generalizations. And the grace of choosing to rise to a higher generosity towards our brothers and sisters.