I have a list of diseases that I hate the most. I hate them because I have no way to fight them. I have no power against them. I push back and push back, but they don’t budge. They laugh in my face. They know my weakness and they gloat. All the while taking the patient’s life an inch at a time. Slowly. While I watch. Helplessly. I feel the burning stares of the patient and their families.
Why can’t she help me? Why can’t she fix this?
I know a thing or two about resistance. Doctors invented it. We fight and resist against the inevitable.
Death.
People look to us to do the impossible. Death is coming for us all, there is no way to fight it, but yet we all still resist. We all want just one more day. Just one more chance. We want to be able to fulfill our purpose, to make the moments count, to have made a difference. When we die, all our work on this planet is over. We don’t want to be left out. We don’t want to be forgotten. How can the earth continue to exist without us?
To be forgotten. As if all the struggle was for nothing. All the angst, the sacrifice, the sleepless nights, the turmoil, the work. All for nothing.
I am not sure I believe that. Sometimes, I’ll look at my children without them realizing it. I wonder who they will become, what will they do with their lives, who will they fall in love with? Will they make a difference in the world? I know that the sum total of all of my experiences and life lessons and those of my husband’s are for them. Everything that I am and have done are a gift to them. I offer them my back, they may step on it, and reach even higher than me.
I resist death for myself and others. Just one more day, one more week, one more month, one more year, one more decade and on and on to make a difference in the lives of those we love and those that seek our help. Continue to fulfill my purpose. To do good work. To be a force in the world for good.
Resist.
Even when resistance seems pointless. Even stupid. Even when others ask, why bother? You can’t fix it. You can’t change it. Just accept it.
On my deathbed, I’ll accept it, but for now, I will continue to resist.
deconstructingdoctor.com 
“On my deathbed, I’ll accept it, but for now, I will continue to resist.”
#word.
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❤😊
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Word.
I just started following your site, and really like this post. I think that death gives us one of the greatest opportunities we could ever have, which is to see the bigger picture. For some, it’s found in religion or spirituality, for some it is simply making a difference in one life (like that of your child or children). But whatever it is, it is bigger than yourself. It kind of frees you from yourself. And also, you get to see that that thing is worth it.
Have you ever read Being Mortal by Atul Gawande? It’s an AMAZING book that I very highly recommend.
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I have never read it but I will be sure to check it out! Thanks for your book recommendation and the insight😊
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You remind me of the wisdom of Wallendar (spg?). Detective work is what he does, what he is. He does it well. For you it is doctoring and I bet you do it well.
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I aspire to do it well. I will have to find out more about Wallendar😊
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Thank goodness you will….
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❤
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These are powerful words and I can absolutely relate. Don’t you also find this to be especially true when your fighting to preserve life (and quality of life) for another. Those 3AM texts about another lab that came back with concerning markers, another fever, still unable to wean from the vent, etc.
At some point, (and I often struggled to recognize this point while I was practicing) there comes a point when the struggle, the resistance, to sustain life is not only an exercise in futility, but also painful. But as you mention so much more eloquently, “On my(their) deathbed, I’ll accept it, but for now, I will continue to resist.”
Thank you so much for sharing!
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It’s a slow realization for some that the inevitable can not be stopped. Often it is the family, sometimes it’s the patient, and sometimes it is us. I have had patients that I had a hard time letting go. I wanted to try just one more thing and they had to say, enough is enough. I’m ready. I have fought the good fight. Death in some ways for those that struggle so hard, can be the reward. It is rest. It is finality. It is done.
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My best gift to the world is my children and that’s also been my greatest gift. Live today like its your last I thinks a pretty good view and leave this place hoping ya did more good. Hope a few crazy stories get passed on maybe. Sounds like your the kind of person I’d want on my side!
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Love this! I know I tell my mom’s stories to teach my children. So in a lot of ways, we do live on even when we are gone.
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That’s why you are a good doctor. I believe there is more than just dieing, I believe there is an afterlife. I have had to many happenings not to believe. I once had a doctor ask me if I was clarevoyent I answered no but he looked at me and said yes you are. I do not profess to be clarevoyent and never will but I do believe in the afterlife.
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All this effort. Could it really be for nothing? There must be more…
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Ya know, I always said that I couldn’t imagine not seeing my children grow up, that I would never want to die before they were grown adults and on to their own path in life. They are all there now, and I think, if some devastating illness or sudden tragedy happened, I would be ready. I haven’t managed to accomplish everything that I would like, but I think I am at a point that I realize I likely never will. I HAVE raised three amazing people though, and that seems okay, and enough. Perhaps that really was my purpose all along…
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Beautiful Deb❤.
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