Quotes. As anybody who has known me since middle school
knows, I thrive on quotes. You look at the space of any dorm, apartment,
cubicle, office, desktop, computer, phone, etc I’ve ever owned, and you are
100% guaranteed to find quotes in some location. Do I plan my life around them?
No, but I do find them both a reminder and a catalytic point of discussion. In
many cases, all it takes is looking and reminding myself to see them.
I started writing this about two and half months ago. A few
things have changed since.
1. I
am 1 week into my last semester in Dominica.
2. A
tropical storm decided to attack the beautiful, gentle, and generous country
that I have called home for the last year.
3. My
hair is a few shades darker.
4. My
plan to buy at dog as a Christmas present to myself is actually coming to
fruition.
5. I
actually have a plan for the rest of my life.
What hasn't
changed; however, is that constant reminder to just stop and take it all
in.
You may be asking, “Why today? What made her sit down and
write today? It’s been months, so why now?” Well, to be perfectly honest, I’ve
been meaning to add more to my previous accounts of this crazy, once in a
lifetime experience that I am lucky enough to experience, but that all elusive
property of time always seemed to limit my ability. As I took a break from
studying today to check my personal email, I noticed there was an updated blog
post on a website that my aunt has started in the last couple months to keep an
account of all her experiences both as a successful, working professional and
as a mother, and also to give other women who are trying to find the same
work-life balance a place to relate and share their experiences (shameless
plug: http://www.happytogetherlife.com/). The post she added today was titled “The Beginning of What I Imagine Will Be
an Emotional Roller Coaster As a Mom,” and though I am nowhere near being in
that phase of my life, it struck me from a different direction- the fact that
this semester will be my last. The last days that I will spend waking up to the
Caribbean out my front window. The last weeks I will see a new cleaning lady on
Tuesday mornings, wondering if my actual cleaning lady, Mavis, will ever
return. The last hours I will spend studying next to some of the most
incredible, intelligent, passionate, compassionate, and supportive human beings
I’ve ever met. Granted, I still have a little over 90 days until I will
actually have all of these last moments, but based on how the last year has
gone, I know these days will go by before I can even blink. As I reflect on my
time here in Dominica, and how the experiences I’ve had have changed me, both
professionally and personally, I wonder what if? What if I had waited another
year to go to school? What if I had decided that medicine wasn’t actually where
my passion lies? What if I had stayed in Minnesota? What if? The me from one
year ago would have taken those “What if’s?” and sat on them. Thinking of them
incessantly; constantly wondering how my life would be different, and in some
ways why I needed to take this particular path. What I have learned throughout
various avenues while being here in Dominica is how important it is to simply
be present. Not only to not get stuck on the “would haves,” “should haves,” or
“could haves,” but also not to be in the tomorrows, next weeks, and next years;
to purely and simply be here and now.
As an aspiring professional in a field that constantly requires
extensive planning and preparation, being in the present can be difficult.
We’re always thinking about the next exam or the next clinical visit we have-
wondering if we’re going to be prepared or not. Planning out the next two years
in an attempt to have a semblance of an idea of where I will be most
successful. What hospitals have the residency program that I’m interested in?
Will my STEP score be good enough? How do I make sure that I make the right
contacts along the way? Anyway, I think you get my point. The thing that is so
easy to forget; however, is WHY most of us decided to go the medical school and
become doctors- we have some underlying desire to help people. It’s as a simple
as that. In order to do this and do it well, we have to be completely present.
Would you, as a patient, want your doctor to be thinking about 5 years into the
future while you’re trying to express your concerns? I know I wouldn’t.
Therefore, for the last few months, as much as I’ve wanted to sit down as write
(believe me, there were many a late night studying that all I wanted was to put
the books away and write), I tried to remain present in what I was studying and
why. And you know what? It was fantastic. For the first time, I didn’t feel
like I was rushing through my material. Instead of trying to get through
reviewing as many lectures in a day as I could, just to check them off my list,
I took my time and tried to dissect them. Not only was the learning process much
more fulfilling, it was also more successful. Despite having heard that last
semester was the most difficult of the first two years of medical school, it
was my favorite. Perhaps it had to do with the fact that we had finally gotten
into pathology and the things that go awry in various disease states, or that
we had more one on one patient encounters than any other semester. I don’t
know. Whatever it was, it was amazing. Was the material always what I wanted to
study? Not for a long shot; but, it finally clicked. I was finally able to
begin doing what I imagined I wanted to do- sit down with a concerned patient,
extract the necessary important information, and start developing several
hypotheses regarding what might be going wrong. Many of you, I’m sure, have
experienced similar things in various times of your life. That moment when all
the work you’ve put into learning a new skill or trying to understand a new
concept finally comes together and clicks. It’s really indescribable.
Of course, as important as school is in encouraging us all
to continue taking things one day at a time, there’s nothing like a tropical
storm to take that reminder to an entirely new level. As some of you may have
heard, several parts of Dominica were hit extremely hard 2 weeks ago by
Tropical Storm Erika. The detail that may be a bit surprising to some of you is
that very little wind was involved. I know when I think of an area being
damaged by a tropical storm or hurricane, I think of the combination of wind,
rain, and perhaps a bit of lightening and thunder. In this case, it was about
12-13 inches of consistent, torrential rain over the course of about the same
time frame. Now, in the United States, that would be a problem. There would be
flash flood warnings all over the place. People would be at the banks of rivers
with sandbags ferociously trying to create temporary dams in an attempt to keep
the water contained. What we so easily forget; however, is that many of these
systems are in place because somebody put them there. Infrastructure.
Organization. Planning. As a country located in the Caribbean, there were
certainly plans and procedures in place in the event of such a natural
disaster; however, as we all know from seeing what a major hurricane did to New
Orleans, these plans aren’t always sufficient for what Mother Nature throws. As
the Prime Minister has toured the island to evaluate the damage, he estimates
the country has been set back by at least 20 years. For those of you who don’t
know, that’s huge for Dominica. The progress they have made in the last 20
years is substantial. So many people’s livelihoods depend on the land and its
ability to yield food, as well as the roads. A large portion of the island
south of my campus was severely damaged, and at this moment, transport into the
capital city is nearly impossible. In several cases, the overflow of rivers
washed out bridges and large portions of the roads. In attempts to temporarily
repair those roadways and restore transport, large rocks were placed across the
rivers. Notices were placed throughout the country and delivered to me from the
US Embassy in Barbados stating that most of these roads could only be traversed
if one was in a 4x4 vehicle. It now saddens me to say, that over the last 3 or
4 days we have gotten even more rain as a tropical depression passed and
additional rain clouds continue to head our way from the Atlantic. As I said
earlier, it’s not completely unexpected- we’re in the middle of hurricane
season and I do recall my first semester last year being quite rainy, but it
still doesn’t bode well for those communities that are already in severe
distress. As of today, the Prime Minister closed all primary and secondary
schools throughout the island and requested that all public officials remain in
their homes. When events such as this occur, I am reminded of how, one year
ago, I was settling into the notion of not having hot water at my beck and call
(or at all in the kitchen for that matter), the electricity going out on random
occasions for no reason with no clear timeframe for returning, and paying more
for electricity than I have ever paid in my entire life. Now, one year and a
tropical storm later, I find the humor and incredible opportunity to adapt in
such events. Many of my colleagues and myself have been without water at all on
several occasions in the last week and have needed to adapt. Take a shower at
the gym instead of at home. Fill your water jugs on campus and store them.
Download all your lectures for the week while you have Internet just in case
the Internet goes out. All of these things we were told when we arrived, but
honestly never thought would actually be an issue. I guess, now we know. So,
with that in mind, I’m not usually one to readily ask for prayers, support,
money, etc., but in this case, please keep the friends who have become my
family in your thoughts as they continue to try to rebuild their lives and move
forward. Them being some of the most resilient people I have ever met, I have
no doubt that they will, but an extra thought or two never hurts.
Now, on a more personal level, the tropical storm did affect
everybody’s travels back to the island following this last break. Instead of
our normal flight into the airport and a 45-minute bus ride to campus, we were
flown into Guadeloupe and then took a 2-hour ferry ride into Dominica. Was it
the most ideal way to travel? For most, not even close. Several people became
ill on the ferry ride, and other people had been stuck on other islands- Puerto
Rico, Barbados, Antigua, to name a few, for several days before they even know
what the plan was. That being said, we all made it back to school in one piece,
as a group, and on a travel itinerary that was completely paid for. The faculty
and staff at our school did everything that they could to make sure that we
were taken care of, and I couldn’t be more grateful. I can’t imagine having to
transport that many people on such short notice with such strict limitations.
It’s another experience to add to the books, and who doesn’t want another stamp
in their passport?!
In terms of my actual break- it was glorious. I ate (almost)
all the food I missed, saw most of my friends and family, and even managed to
make it to the Great Minnesota Get-Together (aka: the state fair). I wasn’t
quite ready to come back, but knowing that it would be the last time traveling
back to Dominica put a different spin on my departure. Although I am ready to
move into the next phase of my education and actually act like a doctor every
single day, I feel bound to this island and many of the people I have met here
more strongly that I imagined. Despite everything that has happened, I am
honored to be able to call Dominica home, and the people I’ve met family. As
school picks up again, I likely won’t be back until Christmas, but know that I
am taking everything in as much as I can, enjoying and learning from every
experience, and am so excited to be moving back to the United States in a few
months. Leaving you all with lots of love, and a few pictures from the last few
months (including the opportunity I had to observe surgery on a United States
Navy hospital ship that visited Dominica for 11 days over the summer!!).
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| Ready for surgery. |
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| USNS Comfort |
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| Sports Day with Dominican school children "My Plate" activity |
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| Pit stop while exploring the city via bicycle |
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| Required pit stop at the U of M building at the fair "Put me in, coach!" |
