At the beginning of the pandemic there was a mask shortage. In some hospitals around the world, healthcare workers had no access to PPE while caring for COVID positive patients, while others had to use the same N95 masks over and over until they fell apart. This pic is of a colleague’s office drawer: masks… Continue reading Saving Masks
Today is Match Day! All across the United States, fourth-year medical students find out where they will be going for their residency training. It’s intense. It’s exciting. I’ve always said that Match Day is filled with the entire spectrum of raw human emotion. Kudos to the med students this year and last year that had… Continue reading Match Day 2022
Prayer is a common intervention to relieve stress and help patients cope during times of crisis and difficulty (Simão, T. P., Caldeira, S., & De Carvalho, E. C. (2016). For some, this act is personal and private, while others find solace in collective prayer. This is particularly true for families of patients, who frequently gather… Continue reading Praying by Zoom
In March 2020, I had been a widow for less than 2 years. LBL and I had been together for almost 30 years. I was living alone and finally starting to get into a daily routine of life without my late husband LBL. Global lockdown hit and it was lonely. Trying to keep my sense… Continue reading March 2020: missing my late husband during lockdown
This memento is my former partner’s bandana. He passed away at the beginning of the pandemic in 2020. He committed suicide. He was 29. We were quarantining in the same town and I was afraid to visit him because I didn’t want to expose him/be exposed to covid. I’m submitting this memento to highlight the… Continue reading Matt’s Bandana
My husband and I had two little hearts grow during the height of the pandemic in 2021. The first baby we lost naturally by way of a miscarriage- while the second was an ectopic pregnancy, meaning the embryo had to be surgically removed along with the uterine tube it accidentally started to grow into. My… Continue reading Two hearts became two angels
February 29, 2020. Huntsman Cancer Hospital. 48 hours and counting down. Four months have passed since the recurrence put her in the hospital. Unaccountable fatigue and a persistent urinary tract infection were the first symptoms. Her lab results returned with creatinine flagged with the letter H, worse was to follow. And like that, a recovery… Continue reading Reflecting
Like so many others, the pandemic renewed my old hobbies while introducing me to new hobbies. For a while, it seemed like being outside was the only safe thing to do, so during that first pandemic summer my partner and I bought a new-to-us canoe from a guy in Ogden. Weekend after weekend, we took… Continue reading Canoe Life
It is getting better, but at times it has been a real struggle with anxiety, depression, and loneliness during the pandemic.At times, I feel like I have lost my mind, thus the small plastic brain as my physical memento.
We both tested positive for COVID-19 on a Monday (fully vaccinated). By Wednesday I started feeling better, but Wally entered the hospital. He slept on three beds; 1) ER, 2) Telemetry, and 3) ICU. On Friday he was gone. A Letter From Heaven When tomorrow starts without me, And I’m not here to see, If… Continue reading Wally & Jackie
