Perspective II

This sort of thing is enough to make one's hair stand on end, even for me, even now, but I thought I'd share, and maybe reflect on my own life and thank my lucky stars. For now.

I just saw a patient: a 45 year old woman. She has a son with Down's syndrome, and her husband is legally blind. She's the primary caretaker of both of them. She has massively metastatic breast cancer, on her third round of chemotherapy.

I'm seeing her for a GI bleed, which is probably the least of her problems, let's be honest. But if I can fix this one thing for her, though, maybe I'll make that one aspect of her situation more bearable.

Seems unfair, doesn't it? Her whole situation? Isn't lightening not supposed to strike twice in the same place? It seems to have struck this lady 3 times.

There is no "fair" when it comes to life and death and illness. It's like an ocean storm, or an erupting volcano, or a freezing winter. How do you call something like that fair or unfair?

Comments

Jill Riter said…
you are her blessing as you help her; I like your style of writing, the way you say things.
December 3, 2009 at 1:19 AM
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