A Shock to the Heart

Each week is bringing a new flavor of this job that I have and more over, of this life that I am leading. Donny and Laura (former interns) both warned me of the shocking self-discovery that this internship is sure to bring about. I thought back to my junior year in high school and the major disillusionments and self-discovering I had done back then and dreaded that this might be a bit like that. However, I had no idea what was in store for me this week.

As I wrote in my last blog, I was on-call at MD Anderson on Monday, available for all families or patients in distress. That was a little tough but I got through it. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday I had some fairly intense and long visits each day. I heard out the patients worries and concerns and assisted them, mostly by listening, in getting through some of it. I thought that I was dealing with it just so efficiently that I had no qualms about going about the rest of my life in the evenings. I then got some news about a friend of mine that has been admitted to MD Anderson with a serious diagnosis. Although this upset me quite a bit, I pushed it to the back of my mind and moved on swiftly to the rest of my life. I thought I had dealt with everything that I needed to.

Although when I didn't get restful sleep on Thursday night, I found out that something was not quite right. I had strange dreams that haunted me throughout the morning such as a dream about me getting sick and being confused. When I got to work, I found it very hard to concentrate on what we were discussing and had very few things to say (which is odd for me). I felt like I was on the edge of tears all day but couldn't pin point why. I decided that I was too emotionally compromised to go on visits straight away after lunch. I picked up my visit sheet in the office (which was enormous and compounded the stress) and went into the chapel armed only with time to spend, a Bible, and pen and paper.

I first cast off some surface stress by entrusting it to God in formal prayer. I journal prayer at night and devote time in prayerful thought throughout the day, but it dawned on me that I had not actually entrusted these things to God in a traditional prayer. I prayed for my friend, my patient, my family, and some other things that were on my list of life anxieties. Once I had swept off the dusty floor of my mind, I was expecting great relief, but didn't find any. I was led to spend some time in quiet mediation, striving to clear my mind from these anxious thoughts and letting words go as a manner of communicating them to God. As I sat there, I still felt pressure building up within me. So, I decided to do the one thing that almost always helps me bleed out some of my worries, I picked up my pen and started to write.

As the words flowed out of my mind and onto the paper, I began to see that this was going deep. Below the dusty floor of my mind, was a trap door leading down into my deeper fears and anxieties. I discovered that most of my anxieties were about things that I couldn't control. The unknowns if you will, had crept in like termites and began to eat away at the structure of my deep mind and heart.

Finally, I was led to the real fear that had been reeking the most havoc on me. It was a fear I had never sensed. It was the fear of not being satisfied with my decision to become a physician. It was my fear of turning away from that. I had never given myself permission in these last two years to want something different, to not be okay with the sacrifices that medicine was asking me to take. I was afraid of not wanting that any more. Silly isn't it?

I have felt, since I made that decision, that my lot was cast, my bags were checked, my boarding pass was non-refundable, non-transferable. I had not given myself permission to look at the big board of flights and rethink which one I wanted to get on. I realized that it was OK to not be ok with the sacrifices that doctors make for my life. I had spent so much time being affirmed and looking for affirmation that I had developed tunnel vision for my life. Everything was about med school. Everything. Grades, activities, my schedule, etc. Even my time with my friends was wasted to some extent when I got a grade back I was not happy about. I was worried for goodness sake about making a B in Organic Chemistry and scoring "Average" on the national standardized final. I wanted to be above average, not for me, but for med school.

My head bowed when I realized this and I identified the sin. Med school and the life of a physician, the power of a physician had become the pearl in the field that I wanted to sell almost everything for. But most of all, I was afraid of the fact that I wasn't okay with that.

Please do not be led to believe that I am altering my whole life plan right now. I am not dropping out of ACU. I am not changing my major. I am not even changing my pre-med concentration. I am however changing my way of thinking about the future. I am going to go into this next school year with a new mind set of finally allowing myself to be myself, allowing my thoughts of the future to be designated by the presence of God, not a stethoscope.

As you can imagine, this was a hard step for me to take. I had drawn a lot of identity from that designation. I am still healing from the scar of where that identity was attached to my heart. I ask for your prayers and your indulgences as I grow into whatever God wants me to be. Even if that is an elementary teacher, Mom. :)

Thanks for all your love, support and prayers. I am so very very very grateful to have such a base of friends, family, family friends, and friendly family to pour my heart out to.