How do we stay connected as humans beings as we retreat from our patients and from each other behind gloves and masks and face shields?
I have been pondering this.
Back in the day when I was doing inpatient medicine, if I knew someone was dying and there was no one to be there with them, I would go and hold their hand until it was over. The thought of dying alone is very upsetting to me personally. I don’t want to be alone. I don’t want anyone else to be alone.
Hospitals right now are not allowing visitors at all. If your mom or dad or sister or husband gets admitted, no one can come in with them… they are alone.
We have made plans for COVID dedicated hospitals in the area. I am on the list to help out at one should the need arise so I have been brushing up on ventilator management. That part does not scare me. God knows when my time is up. I won’t be reckless. I just know that I could walk through a room full of coughing COVID patients without PPE and if it isn’t my time, it isn’t my time. But knowing that if we are overrun, I may not have the opportunity to linger at the bedsides of those on their way out really bothers me.
I wonder what all of this is going to do to us. What will the world be like in the other side, when the danger has passed? I don’t feel like a hero. It bothers me when people say that I am. This is my job. This is me being human. This is what we are called to do, to care for others. All of us has an opportunity to be a “hero” to someone right now. Whether it is giving food or money or emotional support to those who need it or caring for someone in a hospital bed. They ALL carry risks. It is easy to hide behind a door, a mask… to disappear.
Don’t disappear.
Behind the White Coat 