up up and away

The rape joke is that you were eight. The rape joke is that at the time, you didn’t know people had sex to express love. The rape joke is that the only other person who’d seen you naked was your mom. The rape joke is that he called you ‘beautiful’ first. The rape joke is that he held your hands together and told you to ‘try harder’ when you struggled. The rape joke is that you believed him when he told you were overreacting. The rape joke is that your grandma called him a nice boy and asked him to stay for dinner. The rape joke is that he winked at you when you apologized to your parents for not coming downstairs the first time you were called. The rape joke is that his friends high-fived him for “getting some.” The rape joke is that you still don’t feel like you’ve regrown the pieces he stole. The rape joke is that he was conceived when his dad slapped himself into his snoring mother. The rape joke is that her friends told her she was lucky someone wanted her. The rape joke is that each year in the United States, 32,000 other women’s bellies ripen with life against their will. The rape joke is that he never learned to touch without scarring. The rape joke is that your classmate thinks ‘have you seen what asses look like in yoga pants?’ is an argument. The rape joke is your new boyfriend kissing you and telling you he ‘raped’ his math test. The rape joke is that ‘Why are girls so scared of rape? Y’all should feel pride that a guy risked his life in jail just to fuck you’ is a popular Tweet right now. The rape joke is that you wake up to the memory of him laughing, “now that wasn’t so bad, was it?” The rape joke is that it’s been twelve years and you still quiver when someone touches you. The rape joke is that he hasn’t stopped laughing. The rape joke is that you forgot how to.

This is the letter I wrote to my friends and colleagues regarding my resignation

One of the med bloggers I really enjoy reading divorces surgery. I’ve stalked her and found her posts insightful, darkly funny, and genuine. Still shocked she’s leaving, but also recognize that I’ve had those nagging thoughts myself. I’ve always told people that healthcare is so arbitrary. I’ve caught things that may or may not have affected a patient’s outcome (who knows if someone else would have caught it later, or if my decision to speak out made the situation worse?). Things are not standardized in healthcare. It’s crazy how small, seemingly harmless events, can alter a patient’s clinical course.

Afterlife

I think there is a certain age, for women, when you become fearless. It may be a different age for every woman, I don’t know. It’s not that you stop fearing things: I’m still afraid of heights, for example. Or rather, of falling — heights aren’t the problem. But you stop fearing life itself. It’s when you become fearless in that way that you decide to live. Perhaps it’s when you come to the realization that the point of life isn’t to be rich, or secure, or even to be loved — to be any of the things that people usually think is the point. The point of life is to live as deeply as possible, to experience fully. And that can be done in so many ways.