thoughts

The frailty of life seems so real. It seems like many events lately have been alerting me to this.

Family medicine posting was in more ways than one an enriching one. To be honest, it has always seem a little ego-bashing to become a GP or polyclinic doctor, as the elitist school of thought was that not specializing hints of your own lack of intelligence.

Somehow though, a mere two weeks spent in Bukit Merah polyclinic not only made me respect these family medicine doctors a lot, it makes me aspire to become just like them.

You see, these doctors are genuinely nice people. They care! And their knowledge is immense. Never mind that they chose not to trod the more glamourous path of “specialist” training in hospitals, they are masters of their own field. And who says they aren’t specialists? Many of them hold a Masters in Family Medicine, a degree that I didn’t even know exists.

I have had wonderful experiences there… the doctors were wonderful and great to learn from; enthusiastic, interesting, easy-going, humorous. I especially liked Dr Sally Ho, Dr Ng Chong Sien and Dr Gilbert Tan. Heh that makes three out of four doctors who took me for class! Ah well. The last one shall remain Unmentionable. *shudder*

Domiciliary care posting was a sobering experience. There was a home-visit where the staff nurse brought me to see a 16 year-old girl who had cerebral palsy. Maybe it was ‘cos of my past encounter with Zahid who had cerebral palsy too but was thriving in his own way, and all those happy kids that zhengyi played with who seemed so normal, I was quite unprepared for what met me.

She was painfully thin. And what strikes me most was how forlorn, how sad, how trapped she looked.

Her name is Li Wei, and she is 16 years old. While the rest of her peers are in the prime of their life, attending school, grousing about the endless schoolwork and the stress of exams, sun-tanning themselves at the beach and hanging out with friends, falling in and out of love, there she lies.

She has a frame comparable to that of a malnourished 6 year old. She was pale, and her hair looks like it was shaved off. Which it probably was, since she had to undergo an operation for hydrocephalus. An ungainly scar sticks out like a sore thumb on her scalp, looking angry and crusted.

Her mother, a kindly-looking lady with frazzled hair and a ready smile, bustled around as we entered the flat. To transport Li Wei to the living room, she gently placed the girl on an old-fashioned pram. A pram custom-made for toddlers, and yet still looked much too big for Li Wei. There was no other word for it, she was skeletally thin. She must not have weighed more than 30kg. She looks at us, the only acknowledgement that we received. Wordlessly, her eyes glinted with unshed tears as the nurse proceeded to change her feeding tube.
“Yes, that’s right Li Wei! Swallow! Ahh, good!” the nurse cooed and made encouraging noises.

My mind was racing. However does any human being endure such pain? From birth, she did not have a chance of leading a normal life. For 16 years she had lain, alone in a big empty bed, cared for by her aging parents and older brothers who do not earn much in days when they are employed.

I wonder, if she can talk, what would she say? How lonely it must be each day, to stare at the sunbeams through the open window, longing and wondering what the world is like. To not attend school, make friends, eat and laugh and watch movies, to fall in love and get married, to luxuriate in life’s simple pleasures, to watch a sunrise and sunset, to see the beauty of the ocean, to smell the sweet scent of the flowers, to walk in the rain, to bask in the moonlight, to dance and sing, to taste sugar, salt, spice and more.

I felt a deep sorrow for her then. For all the what-could-have-beens.

It makes me want to shout out to the world, there are always these people we do not know of. What right do we have to complain, to yell, to vent our frustrations and say that life just isn’t fair?

And it makes me want to do all those things that life can ever offer. Make more friends, study harder, do more charity, try para-gliding, earn my keep, be a real caring doctor, be a bridesmaid to my sis, get married myself, have a brood of kids, and love my loved ones with all my heart.

“I expect to pass through this world but once. Any good, therefore, that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now. Let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.”

I say this quote in the newspapers, it is the sentiments of a 18th century man named Stephen Grellet. And it just makes so much sense.