Category: The Night Shift

I’ve been home for a few weeks now. I’m out on disability. A bruised trachea  apparently takes a few weeks to heal. Who knew? The PTSD from being assaulted takes a lot longer. I wonder if I’ll ever feel comfortable seeing patients one-on-one again. I got into psychiatry because of Chris. At the time, I…

I keep my eyes closed. I think I’m in a hospital bed, but how did I get here? “Eliza, are you awake?” I try to move my foot. I think it moves, but I have no way to tell The voice is familiar, but I can’t quite place it. It sounds friendly. Maybe I should…

The room starts fading to black. Voices start to muffle. I feel the noose tightening around my neck. Nothing makes sense. I feel someone tugging at my waist. I am flying Then everything fades to black. *************. ************* ********** ************* It’s hard to swallow Everything hurts. The room is too bright. The incessant beeping is…

Chris and I went on our first vacation together. I love going to the beach in winter where other people are practically non-existent. We rented a house that had a hot tub and fireplace. We played house, and pretended that everything was perfect in our own little world. “What are we doing?” I asked Chris….

Long-distance relationships are not easy.. I don’t think it would be possible without cellphones and pagers. A quick “RU UP?’ lets us chat at 3a. I think everyone can agree on that. It’s even more challenging when one person works night shift and the other works 24-hour shifts. The best thing about our schedules is…

On March 15, I went on a date with Chris. You know what they say about the Ides of March. Actually, that has nothing to do with anything. It’s just a convenient way too keep track of the date. The pretext was that Chris asked to see my photos from my recent trip to Italy….

I’ve never been nervous going to the hospital before. Of course, I’ve never been on a date in the hospital before. Tuesday, I met with my old boss Gus about picking up some extra hours at the hospital where I used to work. I usually have 8 days off every other week and I hate…

Jeremy promised to take me to Italy after graduation. I got so excited. I think I fell in love with the idea of Jeremy more than the reality. I loved his mom–a native Italian, and I loved the promises he made. But the reality was he had a lot of baggage and I wasn’t the…

The All-star brake came and went. Justin went to Ontario, and I didn’t. And after that, things just weren’t the same. He stopped coming by the peds hospital in the mornings and I stopped going to the arena after practice. My friend Wendy and I went to the first home game after the break. Justin…

I need a break. From life. From men, and definitely from my patients dying. Or becoming orphans. Winter has not been kind to the NICU/PICU kids. There’s been a horrific pertussis outbreak. The pediatric cardiac PICU opened up with it filling up on day one. There’s even been a spate of random accidents that has…