ICU Nites

I am back in my dreary matchbox of a room, after yet another night in the ICU, and all in all it was a pretty uneventful one, which means that I didn't have people dying all over me,, but this complacency was somewhat shaken by a patient choosing the last few moments of my shift to go into a transient hypotensive state, which, thankfully was quickly averted,,,Whew!!

So, here I am, with nothing to do but twiddle my thumbs, and since I never could get myself enrolled into the elite clique of thumb-twiddlers, I thought why not regale my meagre readership with yet another mad, Illogical and warped but entirely original, episode of what goes on in my head,,,

Tomorrow, come evening and I shall be headed off to yet another night of boundless joys at the ICU, and this, I know, will be preceded by an hour of agonising deliberations on what to wear,, which will finally leave me as nondescript as always,,and after reaching there I proceed to take a 'hand-over' from my colleague of the previous shift,,I have the quintessential black-tubed, aluminium laced, talisman cum ID dangling from my neck, and before anyone starts wondering at the seemingly STAR-TREK inspired dress code here, let me clarify, I was talking of the Stethoscope,, the wonderful tools we Doctors have which allows us to listen to your every heart beat, at the same time taking us farther and farther away from all emotions linked to it, leaving us like, unfeeling data banks, with pre-programmed auto-responses to any given situation. When I use the word " Talisman" I do so with a reason, this is the thing that separates us from the so-called laymen, this is the tool that supposedly means that we have the answer to every query the family of those admitted here have,, and so also a solution to every problem, a way around every hurdle their patient faces on the way to a speedy recovery,,,If only that were true,, all of those who are placed in this unfortunate position will understand what it feels like to have eager, expectant eyes turned to you, bated breaths waiting to hear one sentence that could mean the end to all their troubles,,and all we do is stand there trying to figure out how best to put the harsh reality into words that would hurt the least,,,,,my vocabulary always goes on an uninformed break at times like this,,,,,We do not always act as harbingers of doom though,,, patients make steady progress, and we do update their families to the latest good-news,,I wish it could forever be just this way,,Just good news, positivity and hope,,,,,,,,,,,,,

You know what makes me go on? In spite of this caustic, cynical attitude? Hope,,

Hope, in the fact that if we work just that extra bit harder, look that little bit more closely into everything that is going on,,maybe,,,just maybe,,,,,,,
PS,,The rains are finally here, I shall now go back to reading my book-of-the-moment,, 'The grapes of Wrath',,,