Missing you

There was a time in my life when I was sitting in a bench in the administration building of my university. Back then I was feeling like a little toddler lost in the supermarket watching the people buzzing around and no familiar face was there for comfort. I thought that having been uprooted from my comfort zone was a crossroad I would never cross once I've mastered that. Perhaps I have not mastered being uprooted or maybe there is just no mastery to it because we get uprooted so many times in a lifetime.

It has been years since I felt this way. First year medical school confronted me with the same adjustment anxiety that left me tormented for months. Finally now after three years, when I thought I have found my niche, my place, my people and my passion, I again feel that same feeling of being awkward, being uprooted and having that same sense of unfamiliarity where no familiar face is available for comfort.

As far is career is concerned, most people in the medical profession call this stage COMPASSION FATIGUE. Working 24-32 or even 36 hour shifts for the past 7 months is no joke. Aside from the lack of sleep, academic demands and the daily grind of dealing with the toxicity of life and death situations, there are more occasions of slavery and power struggle. Nurses order us around. The facilities of fuming hot consultation clinics and dripping conference rooms house our day to day activities. Benches and counters are converted into study tables and nap areas but it may also be quite impossible to get some naps if you get calls of patients pulling out their IVs and catheters in the wee hours of the morning for you to put them back in so they can have their medications.

These are just some examples and there are a lot more of powertrip and heartwarming and heartbreaking stories to tell but the bottom line of all these is that it's really really really tiring. These days I go to the hospital for the attendance so I don't have to pay the exponential demerits that goes with absences. I only find myself making sure a patient doesn't die on me and sometimes they just do. It's frustrating looking myself at the mirror and feeling mediocre about the way I conduct myself in this noble profession but efforts at improvement are as parched as this wretched drought. I know exactly what I am supposed to do but I don't find strength nor enthusiasm to start doing them today. I end up procrastinating.

As for my social life, there's the occasional going out with friends. I try my best but when I get home I feel more tired than ever. I thought going out would give me a break from the routine I'm stuck in but I end up finding more excuses to crawl into my hole as soon as I'm done socializing.

Maybe, all these boils down to losing the presence of someone very dear to me. I am usually not one of those persons who wraps around my life on a particular individual but after three years of being together it just happen. Unaware our lives were intertwined and now that we are in a long distance relationship, I feel so lost.

I used be positive at our system of education, though imperfect, he is that blessing that draws me to the hospital everyday and starts my day with such freshness and energy. And, when confronted with tiring tasks and frustrations, he was there, with his shoulder and his hugs to make me feel alright. Now I can only get that from his texts ..."Mwah.."

I kept my circle of friends but he was the one I opened up everything for the past three years. Now, this separation anxiety is so severe I can't even talk to people or at least really express what I truly feel - sad and lost.

And yet, despite this misery I am thankful for the bit and pieces of texts that take a few seconds of our busy day just to connect and the few minutes of calls just to make me know he's still around, even miles away.

I have been uprooted once again from my comfort zone that is him. I feel once again like that toddler lost in the supermarket unable to walk confidently and find my way around. I wish my heart would expand like a big balloon to engulf and include those around me and that I would find in them that small part of inspiration that he monopolized for so long. But until then, I remain in this little hole... missing you.