The heart monitor beep is the most infuriating sound I've ever heard. The continuous beep reminds me of the last time I came to this “hospital.” I thought hospitals were supposed to save lives, but I guesss I’ve been misinformed. I hate this place, this place where doctors act like they care, act like they feel sorry for you. How could they possibly know how you feel? Why do they even pretend?
I hate them all. The constant murmurs, the concerned looks, the sympathetic smiles, all of it. I’d be better off dead than suffering through another day in this place, this place they call a hospital.
I think back to the day they told me my mother was dying, and that they would try all they could to save her. Ha. “All they could.” What a joke. She was just another one of those lab rats for them to test on. Who cares about the woman who's going to die? Why bother there's clearly no use. That’s what they thought to themselves while she laid on
that disgusting hospital bed. The bed with the hinges that sounded like a low dying moan, that bed that smelled like mothballs. I thought to myself WHY? Why her? My mother was everything to me. There was no one quite like her. I miss the way she would caress my face saying, “Hey everything’s ok.” I miss her silky blonde hair that smelled like strawberries. The way she would read me bedtime stories, taking the time to act out every character. The countless hours I spent crying and praying for her were useless. People die. That’s the reality of it. But why? Why can't I stop thinking about her?
I've always considered myself a rational person but when I think of her I’m filled with anger, contempt, and pain. 7,063,866,263 people in the world and not one could save her. Not one bothered to ask about her. Not one cared when she died. July 19, 2011. That day will always be burned into my memory.
It wasn't just the day my mother passed away it was the day my dad did too. He stopped talking; smiling, laughing, and most importantly he stopped living. Now I’m rotting away just as my mother did. Jack always said I’m going to be a doctor. “ I'm going to save lives. I'm going to save your life, Alice.” I would always tell him there was nothing wrong with me and to shove off. Now I realize there is something wrong with me. It’s everything.
When I look at people I see the worst. I see the pain, the rage, the sadness in them. I see nothing more. They revolt me, these people. They laugh pretending they're fine when they aren't. Even when they’re at the breaking point about to fall off a bridge with no support, a never-ending bridge sweeping them into a black hole of darkness filled with pain. I know the truth behind their masks of deception. Its nothing but pain; The girl who makes jokes saying she’s fat with no friends really does believe it, just doesn't want to admit it to be marked as the loser, the drama queen.
Or even little miss perfect who does everything right. Everyone knows about her. They know her dad’s an alcoholic who hasn’t been sober a day in his life. We know this story yet nothing is done. When was the last time you listened to someone, really listened? Not pretending, but truly caring for that person’s well being? When was the last time they entrusted in you to keep their secrets? Now think back to that time. What did you do with those lethal words filled with guilt or grief? The secret you just had to know thinking you would die otherwise; the words you wish you hadn’t heard now because they fill you with conflicting emotions. The emotions you can't deal with. The emotions you can't be bothered with. Have you ever thought of how that other person felt? Why is it that when they make a mistake its all they are to you? It defines them. No, there is no definition to people. You know nothing but one side to them out of the thousands.
Why? We’re human. Revolting things really, killing others for our own enjoyment. The people who say they don't are just kidding themselves.
When I was five I would always smash ants with my hands and feet. For the simplest reason that I could. I didn't think twice about ending their lives, just that it was fun and I was bored. Even though I didn't know it was wrong it didn't matter. I still killed those ants who did nothing to me. We’ll never notice those missing ants I killed when I was five, just as we’ll never know what my mother could’ve been doing now, or even about my dad if he was still the good-natured man he once was. The man who would put me on his shoulders and swing me around calling me his little monkey. The man who smiled so much he had wrinkles.
Who knows what could’ve happened. Maybe I would have ended up a lawyer or engineer. I look around and I see people just like me. The people so far gone they would rather die than live another day in this world. People are like icebergs: you see a little part of them never the whole side. They drift around never truly knowing their purpose in life.
“ Don't judge a book by it cover.” Many people know this proverb, but why is it not put into use? People look at me and say, “Oh, look at that girl hair disheveled clothes dark, and gloomy disposition. Those scars running up her arms,she's a troublemaker that one. She’s one of those people who just gave up. She’s one of those people better off dead than alive. She probably never did anything in school. Her parents are probably drug addicts of some sort.” They haven't met me, yet they know me? How? That’s just it: they don’t. The girl next to me is a 14 year old with even more problems than I do. Sitting upright in her chair looking out the window longing to be free, the caged bird in one of Maya Angelou’s poems. She has no scars. She wears a smile on her face, but inside is a black heart that just can't beat.
Some doctors look and see a sick patient and think prescribing some pills is enough. Pills aren't going to bring my family back. They aren't going to fix my broken heart. Doctors don't see the true pain. They look past it like they’re in some other world. They act as though they’re gods and we’re mere mortals. They forget we’re people. They make crude attempts to make themselves distant so they don't have to feel. So they don't have to put themselves through the pain that we suffer everyday. In reality they’re hurting just as much as we are maybe more. I started out feeling as though everyone was just disgusting, revolting, not worth the time of day. I now know it, the truth.
The truth is we all are in pain. We never truly know how much we are hurting others and ourselves unless we express ourselves, and sometimes even that isn’t enough. We start the day off happy, on top of the world. We end it defeated, lost, wondering what makes us do the things we do. Religious people turn to God blaming him for their sins. others look at themselves and say “this is your fault, no one but yours.” Religious and rational people all try to fix their wrong doings maybe in different ways but all of us strive to be perfect. We all want to reach our potential. We can't judge people alone by the tip of the glacier, but by what is beneath that tip.
That’s what I think as my buzzer goes off telling me that I have a patient that needs to be cared for, a patient who I may not know everything about, but one that I will grow close to all the same. I close my laptop and I put my lab coat on and stare at the name so elegantly etched on the thick white fabric. Alice Sharp M.D.