Dear future self,
Remember that day on surgery you stepped into the OR for the first time? How you had no idea you were supposed to pull your own gloves for the scrub nurse from the supplies cabinet, or that you needed to stand an arm’s length away from the equipment table to avoid breaking sterility? Remember how scared you felt? How clumsy you were when you scrubbed in, in a too-large gown that you had grabbed because you didn’t know where the smaller ones were? How embarrassed you were when your nose started itching after you scrubbed in but you couldn’t itch it through your mask because that would make you unsterile and so you had to ask the circulator in the room — a stranger who you’d never met but who you were sure already hated you for being such a newb — to fix your mask for you?
And then, remember how that one resident reassured you, told you that everyone’s first time in the OR is like that, and that you actually did a great job? That your hands were steadier that many other medical students’ hands? And that maybe you could even be an amazing surgeon one day?
Or how about that call day on pediatrics when you had woken up at 4:30 a.m., been at the hospital since 6 a.m., and were still at the hospital at 10:30 a.m., during a tough week filled with heart-wrenching cases? You were worried about driving home that night. You felt the exhaustion throughout your body — both emotional and physical. Remember how you had that one resident who, without you saying anything, noticed the toll the week had taken on you? Who offered you her bed in the call room and insisted you take a nap before you drove, just to make sure you wouldn’t get in an accident on your way home?
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