A Somber note

Haven't written anything in a while. I really have no idea what I'm going to write about now. Honestly, not a whole lot has been going on. Well, I will take that back. A few things have been going, but I don't think they would make for good blog material. Just mindless blather about how my past week has been. The short of it, I just started back on rotations and it seems like this one (OB/GYN) has the most brutal hours ever. Probably worse than Surgery. However, Surgery get a leg up on being the worst, time wise, because it is 12 weeks long. I'm not looking forward to that whatsoever.

I suppose I do have something that is a bit somber to talk about. I recently ran into a woman that I did not recognize when I first saw her. I happened to walk up behind this person, her hair was shorn short, she had a very slouched posture with her head leaned to one side. Her walk was pretty slow, her upper body was hunched forward, and her left arm just dangled at her side like spaghetti noodle. On any other day, I would have simply dismissed this person as someone I didn't know and keep walking. But today, I paid attention. Then the longer I looked, the more I began to realize that this woman was no stranger to me. She was actually someone that I knew and had just spoke with not but a few months before.

I met this woman right when I started medical school. And over the past few years, I would say that she was definitely the foundation on which my medical career has been built. The last time I saw her, she was the one who told me that I could do the work and that she expected great things from me. I never want to let her down. And now to see her like this. It was like being smacked in the face with a brick. How could this have happened to her? She looked nothing like I remember. Part of me wanted to run up and talk to her. Smile at her. Act as if her current state meant nothing. Instead, I stood there in indecision, watching her walk away from me. Using the excuse of "Well, she is talking to another student. I wouldn't want to interrupt"  I tried to make myself not feel bad that I didn't call out to her. 

She has cancer. Cancer that was in remission. Something that we, as a school, believed was gone for good. And now this. And to her of all people. It makes me more than sad.