"Dear resident, you are being contacted for
redeployment..." I had to do a double take reading this email.
Redeployment? I may not be a soldier in the conventional sense, but as I stared
at my screen in awe, it became painfully clear that this is war. Our freedom is
restricted to ensure our collective safety. Our food is rationed as
demonstrated by the stream of signs in the grocery store stating: "please
no more than two articles of each item per household.” Around the globe we face
a similar unsettling climate, fearful of what's to come and unsure of how long
it will last. The clicks of the hand sanitizers are our drums of war. The
masks, face shields, gloves, and gowns are our armour. Yet our enemy is
invisible to the naked eye. As far as I know, this is the first time in human
history that we are fighting a war for each other and not against each
other.
As the days turned into weeks, the "rule out COVID"
on my consult sheets slowly turned to " COVID positive.” One by one services
shut down and wards were repurposed in preparation for the influx of patients
requiring more care.
"Mrs. G spiked a fever last night. We've swabbed her
for COVID and rearranged the rooms to put her in isolation," said the head
nurse. I could see the worry in her eyes. The scraggly blond hairs jutted out
between the taught elastics of her surgical mask, almost as though they too
wanted to flee the situation. I frantically flipped through the chart, praying
to find a possible history of exposure—perhaps a family member who came for
dinner? Recent travel? Anything to reassure us that it wasn't acquired in
hospital. Yet I found nothing. At 4:55 pm, nearing the end of my shift, I
refresh one last time to see if the result is in: SARS-CoV-2 virus detected. I break
the news to everyone, and our hearts all break at the same time. Contact
tracing is initiated and everyone who interacted with the patient without
wearing protective equipment is sent home on mandatory quarantine. Our nursing
staff halves within a week.
I open the box of masks one morning to find only one left.
We look around, with furrowed brows and palpitations. None left on the ward. Is
this it? Is this the day we've finally run out of masks? But somehow, we always
find more. Sometimes we must wait a few hours but eventually they come. I've
stopped seeing most patients altogether—sending one person in to do my physical
exam and report back with the findings in an effort to save equipment. As I
write my discharge summaries, I'm seeing less patients going home and more
patients being transferred to the COVID wards, many of whom will take their
last breaths there.
Day in, day out, after watching these scenarios play out, I
retreat home to my empty apartment, left only with my thoughts and last week's
leftovers. I think one of the hardest things about being isolated is that you
realize how vulnerable you truly are. You are now stripped of the many outings
and work meetings you hid behind to avoid those deep dark truths within yourself.
Slowly, I've started dealing with these truths. Love from my partner, family,
and friends has helped to catapult a flurry of personal growth.
These are dark, scary times. Thankfully, darkness makes the
light that much easier to find. Like the sunshine peeking under your bedroom
door in the early hours of the morning, we must cling to those tiny rays of
happiness when they strike. That warm fuzzy feeling when you catch up with a
close friend that you haven't seen in years because your workloads have kept
you apart. The smiles after achieving the perfect April fool's prank. The
stopping mid-meeting to sing a colleague happy birthday as loud as you can
until they blush uncontrollably with embarrassment. Yes, we are at war, but we
can also find peace within that. There's still beauty in this time of tragedy
and I encourage you to use your newfound time to find it. You'd be surprised to
see how it has been there all along.
