Trigger warning: A topic on death.

Coping With Death

Reba Sebastian

You might be thinking it is such a dire topic to discuss, but what better way to tackle it when it is
least expected? As future healthcare providers we are required to handle death and the events leading
to it. The strict system tells us that we have to keep our professionalism, keep our distance. Times are
changing and it is important that we remain in touch with our empathy while training. The main reason
why I decided to write about this is because of my first-hand experience with it. Although it is deeply
personal, I find it healing to share about it and in that process try to humanize what it means and how it
had related to medicine.

In that small, provincial health center with its less than a hundred beds and minimal equipment,
I saw someone cross. Medically, we watched her code right in front of us. We had been lucky – we had
expected it to happen; she had been battling with this for so long and knowing that her hardships and all
the pain will be gone relieves us. However, as peaceful as it might be for her, the living have to keep on
going. In that small, provincial health center, despite having an overwhelming barrel of emotions, I had
to step up. I had been doing so since she had started to deteriorate, having a medical background and
the eldest in the family. There was pressure to keep my composure, my head, as the tired on-duty
physician asks me, “Do not resuscitate na po, Ma’am?” I could only breathe in and nod my head in
response. A few months after, I started medical school.

Healing was not exactly forthcoming. Peace was elusive and there were a lot of questions left
unanswered. I had then come to the hard realization that there are a lot of stuff one really cannot plan
for, no matter how long it had been expected to be. Medical school was the kind of passage that I went
through to cope. Saying that it was extremely difficult is an understatement. I tried to logically think
through the grief: what I learned in school, I tried to relate to my experience. Modules were memorable
because I knew that it was what happened, and it was hard to forget.

It was wrong of me to deny these emotions and hiding behind the jargon was
counterproductive. I tell this story to remind you, who reads this, that your medical education should
not be a shield to express your emotions. To dehumanize the patient into terms for a journal or for them
to become just a statistic reverts our training in changing the cold physician standpoint. We must
advocate for our patient’s emotions, be in tune to their fears and be there to reassure them that their
health is our priority. My story is only one of many of yours who had gone through the same situation.
Let me remind you that despite having had them, and the emotional turmoil it had caused you, this will
make you into the empathic physician you aim to be.