In the Mirror

Until this week if you would have asked me what the hardest part of medical school was I would have said changing the parts of me that needed honing to succeed in medical school. It has ground me ruthlessly down via a relentless daily scouring until I shed the bad habits and unnecessary clutter that I've carried like suitcases for years.

I've learned I can't always be there for everyone, goodness knows I can't even be there for people I love many times. I've learned the world goes on anyway and the people I love and who love me do their best to understand.

I've learned to draw lines around myself emotionally and protect what little vital energy is flowing in my soul and not waste it on things that aren't important.

I've learned how much time I've wasted in my life and what's possible to accomplish in 30 minutes.

I've learned that I need help, desperately.

And in spite of what the American/Protestant way has woven into every fiber of my soul. I've learned that motivation and self-control should be regulated.

I've learned when motivation and self-control are given free reign they cause my heart to die and my body to become ill. That there is a point where you can have too much self-control and too much motivation. Imagine that.

I've learned, "They're the expert... Why not try it?" Isn't always the best sentence to live by. That experts don't know all of what is best for the individual.

I've learned that it is only healthy to change so much at one time.

I've learned that there are things that are my essence and I shouldn't change them or they break my soul.

I thought the list above was the sum of what I needed to learn...

Then I went for a climb, my first trad multi-pitch 480 ft climb, and my perspective changed; my heart beat again. I was ready to learn the real lesson.

Today I should be studying, and I will. But instead I've sat for awhile, looked out the window and cried. I had a long text with my mom. I ran across a Ted Talks that spoke to my heart...

http://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_listening_to_shame.html

And I realized the personal change hasn't been the hard part.

The hard part is trusting myself, accepting I am smart enough, wise enough and have what it takes to survive. Not just for medical school but the future that sits before me.

The hard part is being ok, that I failed a class and being ok with the shame of not being perfect. Facing the critic inside that will never be satisfied and with a smile saying, "I am satisfied".

The hard part is learning to look in the mirror and loving what looks back, even if I'm messed up.

The fight isn't medical school, the fight isn't changing habits, the fight is with myself.

Medical school isn't special. We all face the potential shame of failure or the shame of past failure. Almost all of us have to make the decision to start the fight again or give into the inner critic every single day.

It takes courage to get back on your horse and go into hand to hand combat.

And so I am trying again to be kinder to those around me, be gentle and encouraging. Less judgmental...

I'm trying to say more often, "Take heart, you're not alone. And no matter how many times you've fallen, I'm proud you have the courage to stand up, face the possible shame of failure and try again. I know what that feels like."

"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."

Achieving at What Price

I wrote this while watching a movie called, "The Doctor" filmed in 1991 for ethics class. I finally had time to stop and think... and here is what I thought...

With all this achieving in medical school, which is amazing... I have one sadness... I forget to see the stars; the moon. I spend all my time inside studying things that are completely enrapturing. Yet I don't see the flowers blooming by the road, the rabbits on the lawn and the trees turning their flaming yellow. I don't see the mountain range I love looming in the morning sky when I drive to school because my mind is focused on von Willebrand and the coagulation cascade.

And that's what's hard to lose. Somehow I'll have to find it and not let 4 wonderful years of my life go by. They say it's a snap and it's gone, they mean that in a positive way. Funny, that's what I fear. Life is too  short anyway.

An interesting dichotomy, I'm in medical school because life is short, too short to not do, be and experience everything I want to and I'm sad because this experience could make it feel shorter.

So on top of all the things I'm learning and the many things I'm adjusting just to survive, I'll have to figure out how to step out of the doorways of my artificial world, breathe in a quiet breath and see again.

Life is not simple.

But that's what makes it worth living.

Fun Fact: Hedgehogs cause Cyclops

We have a subfamily of pathways that is active during the fetal period called Sonic Hedgehog. If there are mutations in it, it can cause babies to be born as cyclopses. This is common in mt goats & sheep in the west because there is a plant Veratrum californicum/Corn Lily/Cow Cabbage that if eaten around the 14th day gestation and it causes the mutation in the Sonic Hedgehog pathway & the babies can be born as cyclops. And yes, it's named after the game, Sonic the Hedgehog.

Fun Fact: Sun Made Dimers

I'm learning all sorts of fun things so I thought I would start putting up fun facts. Here's the fun fact for today:

For every second of sun exposure 50-100 dimers are created in your exposed skin cells. These are caused by two base pairs or nucleotides (nobs that code for your proteins) on your DNA covalently bonding (sharing electrons) and causes a problem in DNA a big chunk has to be cut out by enzymes, unzipped from the double helix, removed, and then put back together and the DNA backbone taped up with the tape enzyme ligase.

So when those errors become more than can be fixed you can have skin cancer.

Stories Told: Lessons From a Storm Part 2

Stories were told. I suspect every disaster has its own folklore that races through the battered towns. Little children rescued from coolers citing women with wings as their saviors, adults flung hundreds of feet only to stand and help their neighbor, five people found in a basement in this town, three people rescued from a basement in another. Each day, without the help of a TV or radio we heard more stories of hope. Each day they brought a smile to our faces.

Humanity needs hope. Most of the time these stories whether partially true, true or truly figments of someone's imagination stoke the embers of hope. They are like a sugar pill, they make tomorrow more bearable and if they are true, all the better.

One story was different. Every disaster or human tragedy has this story. The characters and places are different the message is the same. It is a story of brightly colored, candy coated poison.

A man of faith had been away from his home and when he returned the valley around his home, a place of drug dealers, was decimated. Houses were piles of rubble. His home, his pets, his cars were untouched. My friend's face was enraptured. The tornado had spun out at the bottom of his hill and couldn't make it up.

I smiled and nodded. My stomach cramped and my heart bled, grated raw by the lack of compassion in the story for the families in the valley. Families who most certainly suffered and will continue to suffer for their loss of life and homes.

In a few of my photos there were shots, specific ones that were a rebuttal to this innocent story that poured toxic into my heart from that day forward. Photos of the box labelled "Missions" that was flung from the place on the granite counter top where items were put in to donate, the counter top pulverized. Photos of an inner wall that has, "Every good and perfect gift comes from above." The rest of the house crushed like an egg. Ironic.

I wanted to grab my friend and beg for him to see, there are no favorites. There isn't always reason, not always an answer to impose upon this chaos. Everyone suffers together. We crave black and white yet are gifted with a insipid gray haze. In that dreaded pallid haze, is a place of grace.  It is here that I found humanity grabbed hands, rough hewn and straight laced, broken and whole, deserving and undeserving and struggled to rise above the obliteration of their existence.

But in my abraded heart I still hemorrhage anguish for the callousness of the 'favored' who will never understand the gift of the haze.

We have Our Lives: Lessons From a Storm Part 1

This morning I woke up with black circles around my eyes, a smoker's voice and the energy quota of a snail. Most people felt they understood what was up. But one friend  cheerfully asked, "What's your problem?" I laughed a little and slowly walked away. How do I explain? Maybe I never can. Maybe you just have to be there. Maybe I'll try, as I explore what a few days in the aftermath of a storm taught me.

The reality is that most people thought that searching for bodies would suck me dry, leave me depressed or stressed. This was a nearly forgone conclusion with many. It didn't. While I'd obviously rather rescue a living human I feel honored to bring closure to a family who would otherwise wonder what became of their relative or perhaps stumble upon their husband, wife, or child's mangled or dismembered body. I have the protection of not knowing the person whose shell became a part of the twisted debris tossed aside by an insatiable storm, they do not.

Why do I spend the evenings alone by the lake to silently reflect?

I climbed over acres, if not miles of rubble, most of it was unrecognizable splinters. I'd see a doll, a pair of jeans, video tape, a photograph of children, a motorcycle chain and a jewelry box all a dull, gritty, angry brown. As I walked I realized each of the items represented someone's life, their money and their hopes. I came across a father, a mother, a grandmother as I walked, each one staring blank at the shards that had been their home. Each one forcefully met my eyes with theirs and with a feverish passion of thankfulness named the people in their family that were alive, their neighbors and friends. While they stumbled in light tennis shoes over boards bristling with nails, cement blocks on edge and the dusty splintered trees, they all had the same conclusion, "We have our lives."

We have our lives. The contents of their homes ripped open, gutted like the prey of an angry dog.

We have our lives. Their cars rolled and tossed by the careless hand of an enraged child.

We have our lives. Photographs of their children, healthy, happy and proud buried in the mud, slowly decomposing.

We have our lives. Vulnerable, stripped and bare.

We have our lives. Their hearts full of thankfulness.

We have our lives. Their hands full of supplies for their neighbors; the one who was deaf, the one who lost a loved one or the ones who sat in mute coma at the place where their front door should have been.

We have our lives.

And so tonight I stood beside the lake, throwing a pebble in and watching the ripples move away. The trees around me reached toward heaven in a majestic verdant hymn of grace. On my heart a heavy responsibility laid bare, throbbing, bleeding fire throughout my soul...

I have my life...

The Strength of What Remains

I was privileged to spend four amazing, heart breaking days with Union College - Lincoln, Nebraska International Rescue & Relief team in towns around Burlingham, AL, where an F5 tornado hit just a day before. What a privilege to see these towns at their most vulnerable moments; watching them rise as strong communities working together to survive.

Daily, we grossly underestimate the good of those around us.

More blogs to come... my brain is still sorting through the experience. 

Most of these photos are available on my Facebook page with explanations under them.