Sutured Dreams

My UG And PG colleges were polar opposites. Our humble UG college only came into existence in 2006. By the time I had joined in 2012, only a couple of batches had passed out. We didn't have many seniors to look up to.  When I had joined MBBS, the general feeling I got from many of the faculty were that we were losers for not joining somewhere better. Many of them had long careers elsewhere in the government sector and only came here after retirement. Perhaps they felt the entire institution was beneath them. And it probably was to some extent if one is to be brutally honest.  But what that meant was batch after batch, students developed an inferiority complex. We were not meant for big things. Most wished to simply pass and see how far they can go in a small clinic setup. We were made to feel like losers and eventually we began to believe that we we'll always be like that.  Students from other colleges seemed to be better than us by default. We felt it was inevitable that we

" Don't let them get away with it ," my father, 3 weeks before he passed away.  Every villain in history thought they were doing the right thing. There was a reason for their myopic greed. Not a good one perhaps, but good enough for their minds to justify it to themselves. And that is the most important person you need to convince of such things - yourself.  Indian Dreams/Indian Nightmares My parents came from very different backgrounds. My father's parents were quite well off. They lived in the city. They owned acres upon acres of land. Ideally, it should have been enough to sustain generations without much trouble. But something, somewhere went quite wrong.  You see while there was plenty of land to go around, wealth wasn't exactly shared equitably. Some became very prominent through education. Others weren't so gifted and became dependent on getting lucky with a property deal or on their siblings or cousins for handouts.  One can easily imagine how in this

  There's a passage in Eminem's * Mockingbird * that has always stuck with me.  "I remember back one year when daddy had no money Mommy wrapped the Christmas presents up And stuck 'em under the tree and said some of 'em were from me Cuz daddy couldn't buy 'em I'll never forget that Christmas I sat up the whole night crying." The lyrics hit different when you've gone through the exact same thing. When you are supposed to be the main provider for your family and fate simply does not allow you to perform that role in the way you'd like, it's the shittiest feeling in the world.  That feeling is made worse when you're a doctor because society expects you to be free from financial problems as soon as you finish MBBS (unfortunately that's not how it works for some).  These are 4 different stories from my past where I truly felt the pain and shame of being broke. Such days always stay with you.  1. Food In the first 6 months of my inter

There are things in life that anyone who has been through real pain in life can relate to - how difficult it is to convey just how bad the situation was to someone else.  Sharing one's trauma is not easy. Don't be surprised if your best friend since many years has been keeping a lot of things from you. Compartmentalising is easier than sharing. People don't need to know how hurt you are and that makes it easier for you to pretend you're not hurt at all.  But there comes a phase in every traumatized person's life where they feel the need to share their experiences. It is at that moment that we make the (very common) mistake of sharing with the wrong person.  And then you never feel like opening up again.  Sharing Pain I've shared quite a few tales of trauma and sadness on this blog but the truth is, things are actually quite worse than it appears on this blog.  A few years ago, a lot of bad things happened to me which I don't feel comfortable writing about or

Names and details of this story have been altered to protect the identities of those mentioned.  I am an asshole.  I wasn't one before but slowly over the past few years I've become one. Now while a lot of that has to do with the nature of the job I'm required to do which requires me to become a heartless bastard quite often each day, it is also a result of the bad things that have happened to me over the years. Every traumatic experience changes your personality bit by bit. You'll find yourself trying to turn off your own emotions as much as possible, slowly losing the ability to empathize with others as a result.  I don't talk as much with patients as I used to. There used to be a time when I could see a 100 patients in a shift and still manage to at least try to build some rapport with a fair few of them. Ask them about what's going on in their lives. I still remember the lonely old lady who'd come every day to check her BP because she felt lonely at home

I was sitting with my friend at the college coffee shop. We were discussing about academics, how to prepare for an upcoming quiz. That's when I got an unexpected call from back home.  It was actually from somebody who claimed to know me but whom I had no memory of. He introduced himself as Shane. Apparently he had arranged some one time duty at some clinic for me many years ago. His number was not even saved on my phone. I'm doubtful whether this story was actually true or whether he just wanted some excuse to talk about why he really called. It didn't take him long to get to the point. Apparently he was going to marry Cathy and the engagement had already happened. He just wanted to know whether there was still (or ever) anything between us as some people used to say.  Rumour Killer Having to deal with this bullshit on the phone was like dealing with a ghost from the past. It'd been so many years since I had to deal with this kind of crap.  I told my side of the story i

When you work in a line of work like medicine, you meet countless number of people every day. You touch so many lives each day, whether that be as a saviour or as a bearer of bad news. We don't like to think of it that much because it can end up becoming overwhelming.  It's only when we're on the other side of the fence that we truly get to appreciate how much an impact people we only get to meet once in our lives end up having on us.  Almost 6 Years Ago It was the short period between the arrival of final year results and the beginning of internship. I remember it was night. I was woken up at around 2am. It was from one of my father's coworkers.  My father had gone to Coimbatore for a short business trip. He was staying in a hotel room and doing what he always used to do then in his free time, watch some rubbish Malayalam TV serials on his phone. That night however, something went horribly wrong.  He started developing weakness over the left side of his body. He had an