Remembrances
by Dr. Andrew
Dott, III
The call rooms of University Hospital are cold,
small, and lonely places for a young intern who thinks he knows it all and
realizes he knows nothing. Separated from family night after night, devoid
of feelings about his own (and others situations) since to “feel about”
would create such an absurd inner psychic state that he could never go on
another day in his journey through the bizarre world of medical training,
the young physician thinks only of daily survival and the hope of being
rested and coherent enough to bring and receive a little bit of love and
joy when finally returning home. We did not dread nor feel joy in that
year—we only did what we had to do being perhaps too unaware of our
skills or feelings, much less the fears and feelings of another human
being.
One night, I was told a young boy had been severely
injured in Alaska and was being transported to Seattle by a Coast
Guard C-130. I don’t remember Doug coming nor his initial
condition. I don’t remember his initial surgeries but I remember well
finding a thin 14 year old boy, barely starting the journey into his
manhood, lying in an intensive care unit after surgery missing a leg with
an arm badly burned hanging on (literally) for dear life. His side was
gone and his liver was protected by a membrane of mesh while we waited to
find out if it would live and die. His parents were there—in shock,
overwhelmed with grief—quiet, not knowing what to say (did any of us),
waiting……. They were gracious and kind people. Sometimes I felt I
received more “mothering” from Doug’s mom than I returned to her
son. None of us could imagine the injuries we saw in that living human
being. I remember day after day giving blood, fluids, watching vital
functions, watching the arm die and vanish as this wee wisp of a young man
struggled to heal. He was in a room with six other critically ill people.
People died all around him but we were so consumed by his physical
problems that I don’t think we ever though about how he might feel about
this. Years later, as Doug and I reflected on those months we spend
together, he shared with me his experiences—the most poignant story was:
He was on a respiratory semi-conscious and paralyzed
from the drugs he was taking and a man died in the next bed behind a thin
cloth partition. He heard us talking about disconnecting the other person
from everything and he thought we were talking about him. He struggled to
tell us he was alive but he could not speak or get our attention because
he could not move or react. Of, we, his physicians, were unaware of his
travails.
Gradually Doug emerged from the acuity of his
injuries and exerted his will to live and survive and we discovered we had
a spirited and saucy boy on our hands. Sadly, I really don’t think we
knew what to with this lad. Perhaps, had we understood better his and his
parent’s needs and resources more and had been able to offer wiser
counsel, his inner healing might have been faster than the stormy journey
he subsequently experienced through his adolescence and beyond.
In medicine we talk about different members of our
profession. One comment is about “typical surgeons” who only know how
to cut but are totally devoid of feelings. It’s somewhat true. In those
years and at that time in our lives, we were so consumed with mastering
the science of medicine that the art of medicine suffered. The art of
medicine is understanding the relationship between mind and body. The art
of medicine is developing the empathy to get into the head of another
person and understand their fears, their worries, their awareness, and
their comprehension. As psychiatrists have recognized for years, you
cannot begin to understand another person until you understand your own
“rose colored “ glasses or filters. The young physician, living in an
absurd world trying to survive, could not know enough about his own
feelings and inner self much less comprehend the magnitude of Doug’s and
Doug’s family’s experience.
Doug has gone forward his life—healing, finding
joy, and accepting his limitations. He has experienced triumph and loss.
He has become aware of the stupidity and destructiveness in this world and
gradually triumphed over it. He has learned to use his remarkable inner
strength and the compassion his experiences have brought him to help
others focus their lives in the face of their disabilities. I have deep
respect for him.
-Dr. Dott was an intern at University of
Washington in 1968.
