Inspired by a patient’s story during one of my clerkship rotations as a CC3.
POD 1 – breath
I wake to the aseptic hum of a hospital morning, the light thinning through blinds like fragile skin draped over bone.
Tears cling to the corners of my eyes; Some from the pain – but most from colossal gratitude since there is also breath:
For the first time in months, my chest doesn’t feel like a suffocating cage.
Jim and Kate – my penguin and puppy beanies – nestle at my side, silent witnesses to the operation before and the years that led here.
Okay sure – a man at thirty should not have to clutch childhood to survive,
but then again, a man at thirty should not have to be this alone.
POD 2 – silence
The ambience buzzes with accuracy and efficiency
A nurse asks about nausea. A student stumbles through kindness. The team rounds like clockwork.
His pulse is counted. His cough is noted.
Around him, friends and family orbit the other beds— they lean in, laugh gently, share pieces of love in warm plastic bags with home-cooked meals to rejuvenate them post-NPO.
When we come to see him
He shares that his only visitor is the thought of his mother – the image of her fading at home flickers behind his eyes like static on a broken TV.
He thinks of her limp hands barely clinging the ODSP forms, the ones he still hasn’t filled out.
He wonders out loud if his fridge is still empty.
POD3 – rupture
The call comes. Another job. Another no.
Another stab in a life made of tears, wounds and last-resort sutures.
He coughs with vigor now. It rattles like a warning.
We see something on the chest X-ray. We recommend, best stay a few more days to be safe.
But he thinks: rent. cigarettes. groceries. mom.
Life did not pause for his thoracotomy.
Life never asked how his heart really breaks. He knows sutures can’t heal those ruptured wounds.
POD 3.5 – departure
Tears cling to the corner of his eyes. Some from the pain,
But most from the colossal responsibility that once again awaits him.
He leaves.
We sigh. We chart. We wonder why he couldn’t be just a bit more patient with himself.
But perhaps a repaired heart, backed by the best tools and science,
Cannot cure the inequities beyond hospital walls.
His wounds are wider than we imagine.
POD 15 – Grand Rounds
And so we reflect:
To mend is not just to cut and stitch, but to understand the human beneath the history.
He was not unfixable. Only unmet.
And so we talk –
What could we offer that helps bridge the gap between recovery and reality?
What would have changed his and others’ trajectories so that,
For the first time in months, or perhaps even years, our patients don’t leave feeling like they are once again trapped in a suffocating cage?
