Sunday, June 20, 2004

Happy father's day to you Papa, your boy's alright and I miss you lots. Sorry to sound morbid, but I've always envied the way you went out... of this world, I should say. Your heart just gave out on you... it almost sounds romantic if it wasn't for the fact that you had spent all those years smoking. It tore all of us up to see you go without a goodbye but I think all that needed to be said had been said before that day. Yeah you burned through your days pretty fast and I think the day you died was just a culmation of the days you gambled with your health throughout your youth. ANd speaking of youth, I must say that each year i get older (you know I'm almost 30) is another year I catch up to your age when you died. Yep, fifty three doesn't seem all that old all as the years of my own life pass.

I spent most of my mid-twenties believing that I'd always be under your shadow and I resented it. I resented it because you were a great man and I believed that your greatness was shaped from the poverty and tragedy you overcame to become who you are. For some reason, the semi-charmed life you provided for me was unsuitable to build the kind of character you possessed. I could see it in the way people looked at you and the way they were ashamed to disappoint you. How could I measure up to that? Who am I? Shit, before you died I thought that I was just an extra in the movie of your life...hahah. But you know what? I know better now, I know you had your flaws and you're weaknesses and you were just a man. My 23 years with you taught me alot and I am doing my best to honor your memory. It's funny to think how a person somehow wished for a tragedy to give their life meaning...well, I guess I got what I wanted but in the end, it was not at all what I bargained for. It's almost morbidly poetic if it wasn't so goddamned ridiculous. Well pa, I know that I told you that I resented being in your shadow all these years...I just want you to know that lately, I'm feeling lucky just to have been there.

"Cowboy Up"
I forgot which B-action flick I was watching where there's a scene where the gruff senior squad leader tells the young recruit to "Cowboy Up" when the shit hit's the fan and they're stuck or something. . .Anyways what I'm referring to are the times when all hell breaks loose and someone has to take charge. My worst fear being an intern(cherry-doc) was just that; a patient crashing and buring and I was the one who had to call the shots. In doctor speak that's called running "the code". I had been lucky up to this past week no one has ever gone south on me when I was alone. I remember working graveyard nights with the lives of over 150 patients in my hands and a busy supervising attending downstairs in the ER admitting. I would get random calls to fix minor things like decreased urine output, renewal of restraints, or high blood pressure. Nothing heavy. . .
I was finishing up my last week of internship in the ICU and usually I come in around 5-5:30 in the moring to see my sick patients. I even ran out of scrubs this particular morning so I did the unusual and wore slacks and a tie to work. As soon as I walk thru the double doors of the ICU and just when I'm about to check in on my first patients, three nurses rush into the room next to mine.
"Call code blue"
My heart froze and I wondered if the other intern was around. She was and she ran into the room and I followed. The monitor showed a flat line and a nurse started CPR already. The patient was already intubated so that saved me some time. That's when I "Cowboyed Up" and took charged seeing that the other intern looked like a deer in headlights. "Get an amp of epi in her stat; call the senior and hospitalist now,", was the last thing I remembered saying and the next 10 min was a blur. More drugs, CPR, checking pulses and we finally got a pulse. Luckily the attending downstairs and a senior overnight resident arrived.
"Hey sport, you want to finish running the code"
"No thanks. . .I've got other patients to see."
That particular patient left our ICU unit off life support back to her other hospital.
"Hey Doc, that's for helping out this morning" the night shift nurse tells me.
"You did all the work, you brought her back, I just stood there and barked orders."
"But you were there. . .Someone had to take charge in the beginning,"he says.
I consider myself lucky because I was already in the intensive care unit the patient couldn't get any more ill and most ICU nurses are awesome. I feel more confident now having faced one of my fears of being an intern. I realize I may not be so lucky the next time but I won't be afraid to "Cowboy Up" when the time comes.