There was a Richard Gere Movie where he plays a gynecologist and through out he keeps getting setbacks until towards the end the scene comes to a car crash in his convertible – Richard Gere just meanders through a storm into some faraway land. He wakes up the next morning to the calls of  a small girl who guides him to her village where everyone is looking for some help – something is happening in a hut. He does not understand the language but then sometimes gestures do the talking. He’s immediately able to make out someone’s giving birth to a child.

We are today in a similar situation. Locked up in our homes for the past 40-50 odd days and doing everything except what we are supposed to, meant to – seeing patients. All the while we’ve been taking for granted our profession, our customers, the love they shower, the gratitude they offer, the significance the society gives us, even the money we earn and the status we’ve defined for ourselves. The lockdown has brought out from us what was within, suppressed, dormant. In more ways than one. For those of us like me, who could never prioritize correctly, it has seemed like a compass that has now moulded our lives to its true meaning. Or not ? Let’s try and rediscover who we really are.

Many of us reconnected with friends and relatives. The mundane monotony of every day life starting 8am and ending 8pm for many of us hardly allowed that. In fact, a phone call, a visit seemed to interrupt the flow of the water and we hoped for that slow current to gather speed as soon as possible. While the other side of the more mature, blood and love, waited for us to  complete so we could share time. But we  never did. Except on occasions, weddings, births, certainly deaths. Even in the busy schedule we recognized irreversibility and attended funerals. So it really had to reach those levels of desperateness for us to involve. The time available to us now almost preaches us to enjoy those moments while their breaths and beats are still very reversible.

Some of us pursued our hobbies which were lying dusted in the lowest drawer of our almirah of priorities. Coin collection, stamp collection, photography, music, dance, painting, sculpting, sport and what not. The more balanced in us have always done this, parallel with profession. But those poor in planning have always been dictated by  professional interviews and their blood reports. And did we take pride in not having the time to do what we liked ?  Now those very of us seem happy, running, cycling, skipping, dancing, singing to glory. It needed a germ to tell us that. The child in us had preferred to remain silent and is now shouting of the new found freedom. We’ve read in books hobbies should be continued – they are a great unwinding to the stresses we face, from tubes and ventilators. But by the time we opened this closet, we closed it. To a tired sleep. And we never dreamt of these. In fact most of us did not have the time to dream. Sapna vina ni aakhi raat….(whole night without dreams)

The academicians in us read up what was lagging. Journals, reviews, analyses, text books – and then the internet – trying to compete with information in medicine is like running after your own shadow. It keeps laughing at us. And we can somehow never win. But we try to and some of us have endeavoured to do that to the extent we could. Utilised the time to update ourselves. Again, this should be an integral part of our daily lives. As professionals we are bound to know the latest and share with our customers. But we relied on conferences and casual brochures for the same. Now we have all the time to read up what we could not. The more poetic in us have preferred to read literature. Some have written, meaningful, inspiring articles. Touching poems. It is not a matter of debate now that humanities fuel empathy. Very important for our occupation. Shouldn’t we have practiced both of these forms of readings even before  ? The shadow once again grins and starts running as we chase it.

Cleaning up the house, household chores – should figure in our time tables. Forever. But we never did. Only now we found that old photograph of our friend’s father that we had been looking for and sent it to the friend in reminiscence. That painting lying in the corner of the table, flat rather than being hung on the wall. That poem we wrote for someone in the ‘Archies’ happy birthday cards we used to buy and give to those who were close to our hearts. The house looks much cleaner now. It should have, always. Habits are the support system on which the twiners of success grow. Hopefully these would be carried on from here. While we took great care of our place of work, we neglected the destination where happiness lay. Those ordinary moments of understood conversations, not so special, which were seldom, finally found words. We learnt to live these brief lives in between Primary life.

Even nothingness has been something in these times. We never knew nothing. Empty sessions. Unoccupied intervals. Thoughtless instants. When it was just us. No one else. No agenda. No purpose. Just living that minute. Those minutes if we had more. But we never had. There was always something. And then there was everything. We’ve now known the value of sweet nothings. A ladder that goes very high has flatness intermittently for us to rest, breathe. Great melodies have inter spacers filled with percussion. Many of us have just lived these nothing times. Essential.

There can be innumerable other things we’ve changed living in this oasis gifted to us by history. And now we’ve tried to bounce back to what was. Tired of the realisations. Having lived the happiness we now yearn for what we were. While we always answered telephone queries readily , some of us have now resorted to video calls and have been more than glad to see our customers in this forced confinement. And over the last few weeks or days, even gone on to actually interviewing and examining our patients. Were we more than ready for this now ? Did we long for this or that ? A perfect balance is Utopic, unlikely, theoretical. Has the rebirth of our clinical encounters made us more satisfied or happy than when we sang and danced ? Who is the real us ? Just when we discovered ourselves, we recoiled back to our cocoon ?

‘No touch technique’ was the plan of OPD proceedings. But then touch happens to be the most empathic of gestures. Whatever conversations we carry, clarifications we make, even listening intently to their problems, their agony, these cannot  susbtitute a gentle tap on the shoulders.

It was after 50 days that I was face to face with someone I’ve been looking after for 15 years. And she’s confided in me all the while. Trust does not have a measure and faith cannot be weighed. Before I realized, I’d got up from my seat and touched and held the hands of that 15 year old faith.

And forgetting all his woes and past, Richard Gere manages makeshift gloves and barriers, warm water and a crude device to cut the cord and delivers a baby boy and the movie ends with his gratifying smile holding the baby. It was the doctor in him that stayed alive all through his mishaps in life.

We are meant to serve. Perhaps out of our many we, this is the real us. 

Dr Sapan C Pandya

Consultant Clinical Immunologist and Rheumatologist

Ahmedabad