Writing Contest
To Be a Better Doctor
By Heather Sieben
Please forgive my actions
they are selfish, focused, driven.
I know you can’t possibly understand
all I’m going through,
but medical school is hard.
I know I said I’d give you time and effort,
that not much would change
(except for maybe the distance between us)
that we would continue to talk
that I wouldn’t change,
because it’s just more school,
nothing different than college.
But that was before I got here,
before I realized just what this place means,
before my life disappeared.
I love it here,
honestly, I do.
(Tomorrow, though, I will probably tell you I hate it.)
Why do I love it?
How can I love something this horribly hard
and personally challenging?
Well because,
I’m going to be a doctor.
Every other doctor has done this and survived and so can I.
I’m a special person;
can’t you see that?
This is who I am,
this is what I need to do.
My time here is valuable.
I don’t have a test for another week,
so talk to me right now
because next week, well, sorry,
you are going to disappear.
Maybe you should go out,
don’t you have friends to go with,
join something to take your mind off me,
and quit making me feel bad about time.
(Gosh, the guilt trips you give me.)
I know I talk to my classmates more than you
but they understand,
they know what I’m going through,
I can’t explain it to you.
I know it’s weird that the only people I want to see
are the same ones I sit next to all day
every day,
but they feel safe.
This place destroys you,
it makes you question who you are, what you want, what
you stand for—
it doesn’t let you be fake,
and yet it understands when you are crabby
and at the bottom—at the very bottom
you have classmates to sit with.
I know you want to help, but you can’t.
You can’t understand,
you don’t know who I am anymore
I don’t know who I am anymore,
except a medical student.
You aren’t supportive enough, this isn’t going to work,
I need to focus on school.
Now I’ve lost you,
med school destroyed us and I’m really alone.
But I’m not.
I have tests to study for, classes to go to, physicals to
complete, histories to write, professors to talk to,
drugs to learn, a vocabulary to memorize.
I have my demands and this is what is important right now,
this is my life,
this is medical school.
But at night
after hours of classes and studying,
after many cups of coffee and chocolate bars,
when I don’t even know what day it is because they all
blend into one mass,
all I want is a hug,
a silent connection so I can let go,
so I can breathe, and feel, and smile and not feel pressure.
All I want is a sense of normalcy.
Do I know what that is anymore?
What is life, what is love, what about my future?
When does medical school let up
so I can have a life?
Does it?
Can I?
Do I get a life?
They tell us to have a life,
that it will make us better doctors,
that being happy will make us better doctors.
I need to make time to be happy,
Make time for life,
Make time for love,
Make time
To be a better doctor.