This is a piece I wrote after my first day of gross anatomy. After my inaugural call day in the wards, it was an energizing read. It is amazing to realize how capable we are of growth, and even more great to see that we are still the same person.
It’s dark and lonely inside my apartment as I throw my backpack onto my couch. The piercing sound of my iPhone’s ringtone breaks the silence. Seeing it’s my mom (and hoping to avoid an hour long conversation about my day), I reject the call, making a mental note to call her first thing in the morning. It’s only Tuesday, I think to myself… I still have over half of the week left. My mind felt numb from the amount of information that had been thrown mercilessly my way in the first two days of medical school—‘learning how to drink from a fire hydrant’ as they called it. Now it was 11:30pm, and I had dedicated my entire day so far to attending lectures or studying at the library. It felt like the fire hydrant was winning.
Just as my eyes close with the dying hope for at least a little rest, I hear my phone beep, notifying me that an email has been sent to our newly assigned first-year inboxes. Squinting my eyes, I see that a professor has emailed out a disclaimer for gross anatomy lab tomorrow. Whatever, I think as I throw my phone back onto the table and pull the covers over my face.
It isn’t until I read the email the next day that the haunting idea of dissecting a human body hits me. The first thought that entered my mind was looking into the coffin at my grandfather’s funeral four years ago. It was the first death I had ever had to cope with in my young life, and I had never gotten full closure on the experience. Yet here I was… in front of a cold, steel box reminiscent of that same coffin. All of the sudden, my heart dropped. I got chills thinking of the idea that the cadaver had her own life, family, and unique lively personality. I didn’t want to pull the body up. I didn’t want to remove the towel. I didn’t want to cut into cold skin.
I made every futile attempt I could to distance myself from the cadaver. Standing two feet away, I observed the dissection as I had observed many surgeries in the past, almost in denial that the body lying in front of me was lifeless. Yet somewhere within the first hour, my interest in the dissection piqued as I noticed my tank-mates having difficulty finding a minor nerve. I found myself palpating the cadaver with a natural expertise, both unintentional and exciting for me to experience. My eyes, with an attention for detail that I had acquired from years of academic challenges, would not quit until I found it. I was surprised at my own innate talent in working with the human body.
From the moment I received my acceptance letter, I have always felt it was something I did not deserve. People worked hard for years to get where I had ended up straight out of college. I had convinced myself that luck had brought me to the doors of Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine. Yet, in that moment in the gross anatomy lab, it felt right. That’s all that mattered. For the first time, I felt like a doctor-in-training. I belonged in this medical class, whether I chose to believe it or not. I had an undeniable natural talent, some acquired knowledge, and the drive to make it through any obstacle that may arise.
By the end of the lab, I felt empowered. I wanted to connect to the same cadaver I was attempting to alienate as much as possible in the beginning of my experience. Somehow, this nameless, faceless person had given me a gift I would be forever grateful for—the ability to explore and look into the human body first hand, the motivation to become absolutely proficient in my field of study, and a newfound confidence in myself as a student of medicine. I now ache to know her name, about her life, her ailments, and what caused her to pass away, but I know it is something I may never learn. I almost feel cheated out of the essential human connection that I realized was necessary in every physician-patient relationship, being given a patient I could not even talk to. I could not express my concern, and she could not express her ailments. Yet, as I walk out of the lab, take off my lab coat, and change out of my dirty scrubs, I feel hopeful that I can share the empathy I was never able to communicate to her with all of my future patients.
It’s dark and lonely inside my apartment as I throw my backpack onto my couch. The piercing sound of my iPhone’s ringtone breaks the silence. Seeing it’s my mom (and hoping to avoid an hour long conversation about my day), I reject the call, making a mental note to call her first thing in the morning. It’s only Tuesday, I think to myself… I still have over half of the week left. My mind felt numb from the amount of information that had been thrown mercilessly my way in the first two days of medical school—‘learning how to drink from a fire hydrant’ as they called it. Now it was 11:30pm, and I had dedicated my entire day so far to attending lectures or studying at the library. It felt like the fire hydrant was winning.
Just as my eyes close with the dying hope for at least a little rest, I hear my phone beep, notifying me that an email has been sent to our newly assigned first-year inboxes. Squinting my eyes, I see that a professor has emailed out a disclaimer for gross anatomy lab tomorrow. Whatever, I think as I throw my phone back onto the table and pull the covers over my face.
It isn’t until I read the email the next day that the haunting idea of dissecting a human body hits me. The first thought that entered my mind was looking into the coffin at my grandfather’s funeral four years ago. It was the first death I had ever had to cope with in my young life, and I had never gotten full closure on the experience. Yet here I was… in front of a cold, steel box reminiscent of that same coffin. All of the sudden, my heart dropped. I got chills thinking of the idea that the cadaver had her own life, family, and unique lively personality. I didn’t want to pull the body up. I didn’t want to remove the towel. I didn’t want to cut into cold skin.
I made every futile attempt I could to distance myself from the cadaver. Standing two feet away, I observed the dissection as I had observed many surgeries in the past, almost in denial that the body lying in front of me was lifeless. Yet somewhere within the first hour, my interest in the dissection piqued as I noticed my tank-mates having difficulty finding a minor nerve. I found myself palpating the cadaver with a natural expertise, both unintentional and exciting for me to experience. My eyes, with an attention for detail that I had acquired from years of academic challenges, would not quit until I found it. I was surprised at my own innate talent in working with the human body.
From the moment I received my acceptance letter, I have always felt it was something I did not deserve. People worked hard for years to get where I had ended up straight out of college. I had convinced myself that luck had brought me to the doors of Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine. Yet, in that moment in the gross anatomy lab, it felt right. That’s all that mattered. For the first time, I felt like a doctor-in-training. I belonged in this medical class, whether I chose to believe it or not. I had an undeniable natural talent, some acquired knowledge, and the drive to make it through any obstacle that may arise.
By the end of the lab, I felt empowered. I wanted to connect to the same cadaver I was attempting to alienate as much as possible in the beginning of my experience. Somehow, this nameless, faceless person had given me a gift I would be forever grateful for—the ability to explore and look into the human body first hand, the motivation to become absolutely proficient in my field of study, and a newfound confidence in myself as a student of medicine. I now ache to know her name, about her life, her ailments, and what caused her to pass away, but I know it is something I may never learn. I almost feel cheated out of the essential human connection that I realized was necessary in every physician-patient relationship, being given a patient I could not even talk to. I could not express my concern, and she could not express her ailments. Yet, as I walk out of the lab, take off my lab coat, and change out of my dirty scrubs, I feel hopeful that I can share the empathy I was never able to communicate to her with all of my future patients.