Anthony Fleg is a family physician who blogs at Writing to Heal.
My patient, a retired teacher, looked embarrassed as he said it.
“I don’t have a smartphone. I don’t have a computer.”
I had to check the readings — somehow, despite this lack of technology in his life, his heart rate was perfectly normal. His oxygen reading was also in the normal range. Skin color looked perfectly healthy. He even wore a smile on his face.
Quickly, trying to keep him from noticing, my …
The game came down to the last seconds.
Down by three, we scored on a layup. Now a one-point game. And then, it was over. A narrow 1-point loss in the championship game for our middle school boys team.
One started crying, then another. It caught on like something infectious, and suddenly parents were tearing up as well. As one of the coaches for the team, I wondered what we could have …
I turned to leave.
She spoke softly, “Thank you. Thank you for coming.”
The way these words were spoken caused me to gulp a deep breath while my heart fluttered.
In my mind, I was doing my job. A physician visiting one of our COVID-positive patients in the hospital.
In my mind, I wasn’t even able to offer her human connection as I would have wished to do.
Sound: Gowned up in PPE, including two …
As a family medicine physician, I am not sure about a whole lot as we turn into the third year of pandemic living. I can’t give you a decent prognosis of where Omicron is going to take us or how many it will take from us. I am not even sure of the public health approach at this moment where COVID seems to outsmart us repeatedly. (A reminder that this …
We had a great conversation throughout the telehealth visit. Maybe one of the best of my week. John seemed to really appreciate our time together. We got ready to close the visit, something I still find a bit awkward over the phone. No body language to rely on or to which I can react.
You would think Zoom would be better, but I still find the closing of a Zoom meeting …
I had a crazy thought.
Each time I walked into a room to see a patient, I would ask them a question that would be more in line with this blog than with the usual “Where does it hurt?” and “What’s wrong with you?” taught in medical school.
Remember that the room I was walking into was often a virtual room (seeing a patient via Zoom) or an audio room for a …
I am guessing you have felt it.
Maybe you have participated or contributed to it.
Exuberant hope
Unmasked optimism
Guiltless travel
After a year of living in fear and isolation, bound and gagged, there is a loosening of the bonds. We struggle and wriggle to get free.
Relaxed restrictions, a return of sports, and indoor dining. Whispers of live music and public swimming pools about to return.
All of it like a fresh breeze on a summer …
As a devoted runner, I find life lessons from this movement that help me get through difficult times.
Journey with me for a moment.
We have signed up for a distance running race. For some of us, this is familiar territory. For others who consider paying money to cover long distances on their own feet a ridiculous contractual agreement, just play along.
As we nervously approach the starting line, our race director tells …
As I finished the endless clicking, the clinic day came to a close.
Clicking to begin and end phone visits.
Clicking to get on and off Zoom visits.
The endless video game clicking that is life as a physician documenting electronic health records. Too bad I have never been a gamer; maybe some who are can imagine amidst all of this they are in a scene from a Nintendo or Playstation classic.
Clicking boxes …
As a healer who has been doing my work in the dark, blind in a sense, today was a big day.
The visit was scheduled, not as a phone visit but as my first Zoom visit since the pandemic began 150 days ago. Usually, I see about 30 patients in-person a week. During the five months of COVID, I have seen about 30 patients in-person total, with the remainder conducted entirely …
“Hope things go back to normal soon.”
That was the text I received from a friend yesterday. It struck me in reading those words that I have stopped thinking or worrying about the end of the pandemic. In those first months, absolutely. Daily thoughts of getting back to normal life.
Now, out of self-preservation and a renewed sense of life’s sacredness and fragileness, I have turned to making the most of each …
Way back when humans listened to music without Spotify, AirPods, or smartphones.
In those BSP (before smartphone) days, people would actually get off their tooshies (the medical term for the gluteal area) and walk over to a thing called a stereo to adjust the sound using something called an equalizer. Crazy huh? Millennials reading this are already distractedly Googling all of this to verify I am not spinning tall tales.
Let’s use …
I just want a few berries.
This was my comment that started the earthy discussion. We were visiting with friends who have a thriving garden producing more than they can consume.
As we talked about the types of lettuce and greens in the neatly organized rows, I heard mention of strawberries.
No offense to the other things growing, but the mention of berries had me dialed in. Where? How many? Ready to pick?
We …
Slow. Sluggish. Feet dragging. Legs heavy.
The run was not the effortless morning wake-up I had envisioned when I sat on front steps tying the shoes. The gazelle I had envisioned, gently bouncing over the trails, had turned into more of a hippo waddling along.
Then, around 15 minutes into the run, I remembered a friend’s wisdom. “Don’t fight the current. Find it and flow with it.”
So, flow with it became my …
I often turn to my children when facing life’s vexing moments. So I did just that recently.
“Kiddos, what do you think coronavirus is here to teach us?”
My 11 year old spoke first, “To be thankful for our health.”
Gratitude, huh?
I step back from this moment and wonder if she is on to something.
Working as a physician and educator, and …
I turned to my 2-year old daughter with a simple ask: “Can you worry about tomorrow for me?”
Blank stare.
“All I am asking is that you worry about tomorrow. Just follow the lead of us adults who make it look easy. Now, can you do that for daddy? (Don’t you know about the latest case of coronavirus?)”
Blank stare.
Now, a quick question for all of us: How much of each day do …
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