Words Left Unspoken

As humans evolved, the first big problem we had to overcome was 'me versus us'. Learning to sacrifice a little individual freedom for the benefit of a group. You know, like sharing food and resources so we don't starve or get eaten by tigers, things like that. The next problem to overcome was 'us versus them'. Trying to see other groups different from ours as equals. That one we're still struggling with. That's why we have racism, and nationalism...

Grace under pressure, one clumsy word, one careless gesture can cause irreparable harm...so focus on facts, what happened? What was the problem and what did you do? Don't make it personal...answer questions directly, this is not your loss, this is not your pain. Never make it about you...and if there's no silver lining? Don't make one up, your job is not to make bad news sound better...even though you're in pain too, even though you don't feel like a doctor, you're just another person, alone, falling into the dark.

You lost your patient. You tried to do all the right things but you lost your patient and you're blaming yourself and I can't make you not feel that but you have to tell them. So just stand here and get it all out of your system and then pull yourself back together again, get it out.

Trauma doesn't tell time, it can't tell if we're 8 or 41, if our kids have the chicken pox or if we have the biggest surgeries of our lives to perform...and when it sneaks up on us, it's easy to think we're right back at square one. But the truth is, even when our brain convinces us we're lost, if we try hard enough, our bodies always remind us there's a way back.

No one wakes up thinking 'My world will explode today, my world will change', nobody thinks that but sometimes it happens. Sometimes we wake up, we face our fears. We take them by the hand and we stand there, hoping, waiting, ready.. for anything.