Big moments are surrounded by little moments. That’s what I was trying to pull out in my story “There’s a Special On Car Washes,” published in the latest issue of Intima. That bewildering sensation, common in life and especially in healthcare, that extraordinary things happen but that time marches on without sentimentality. You win the big game but when you get home you still have to take out the garbage. You receive a life-changing diagnosis and then you have to figure out the machine to get out of the hospital parking lot.
Read moreIt’s Happening to Me, Too: Reflections on Interconnectedness, Interdependence, and Independence in Caregiving Relationships by Leena Ambady
“Every thought begins with I. This is happening to him, I try to say,
not happening to me. But it is, too. This is my place to tell it.”
The above is an excerpt from Kristin Camitta Zimet’s “A Dialysis Diary,” (Intima, Fall 2023). In this beautiful essay, Camitta Zimet writes about her husband’s end-stage kidney disease, the initiation of dialysis, and the impact that his chronic condition and the treatment it required had both on her and her relationship.
Read moreListening to Beethoven: A Reflection on Professional Responsibility and Personal Recognition by poet Susan Carlson
“I like Beethoven the best!” is a declaration made by a patient of Mitali Chaudhary, as she readies to leave his hospital room. A busy senior medical resident at the University of Toronto, Chaudhary juggles many demanding responsibilities with her desire to get to know this elderly patient. In her Field Notes essay titled “Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5,” published in Intima’s Fall 2023 issue, she recalls how she’d tried to get her patient to respond to questions about symptomatology, all the while aware that twenty-three other patients – along with a group of junior residents and medical students – were awaiting her time and attention. In that moment, she finds herself turning away from an opportunity for a personal interaction with him in order to ensure she manages her tasks appropriately.
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