Prudence and Madness

Ten months can mean a lot of things.

For a pregnant woman, ten months of waiting can make her worry, wondering why she hasn’t given birth yet, and the anticipation for the newcomer all the more increasing the burden.

For a high school student, ten months amount to a school calendar year.

For an average person, ten months mean 2 more months before becoming a year older (which to some can be a horrifying thought).

But what does ten months mean to me?

As I was rearranging folders and papers at the clinic where I work, I realized that it has been 10 months since I have sworn the Hippocratic Oath. I realized that it has been 10 months of practicing medicine with a license. I realized that I survived ten months practicing Medicine, a field of work which can make even the toughest persons cringe or the most intelligent person lose sanity. More importantly, I realized I was able to heal. I saw patients, who came to me ill and miserable, walk away healed, or at least on the road to healing. And the skill I have learned from enduring the hell of medical school and the purgatorial world of internship (I may have to blog about these worlds, as was suggested by a friend, to make other people realize how difficult it is to produce a doctor, but this is a topic for another blog post) has helped them become well.

These are nice, heartwarming, introspective thoughts. Just enough to help me retain my focus in life, because somehow these days I’ve been feeling disenchanted with my work. But there is still a long, long way to go.

I hope I will have the strength to surge on.