the award that gets old

I remember being in 4^th grade s/p my first winter in plaster. I was the Blue Caterpillar in Alice in Wonderland. We made my wheelchair into a mushroom out of tie-dye fabric. By the time the play rolled around I have been rehabbing for a while and was walking. So I took the fabric and put it around my shoulders as wings and was a butterfly for curtain call like in the Disney movie. Every one in the play got an award mine was Most Dedicated or something along those lines. The director talked about facing hardships or other such stuff when she was introducing me. It was ok but I remember being jealous of the all the other kids who all got things theater related awards like most in character or improv diva, most creative or even most improved actress.

On the last day of 7^th grade we had an award ceremony for our team. I was on the Tiger team. All the teams were some kind of great cat because our school mascot was a wildcat. Several weeks earlier I had been on my way to an honor roll ice cream party behind the school. I started to go down three or four steps and the railing broke. I fractured my lf hip (and its still haunting me all these years later). I was put in a hip spika cast which is basically a medieval torture device with an abundance of cotton padding. This was after walking on the hip for a week because no one including my Dad could find the hairline fracture on x-ray….I also rewrote my part of Templeton in Charlotte’s Web which opened the day after the accident. My Mom took me on the last day of school to the ceremony. Every tiger got an award, a superlative of sorts some were funny, some were how smart you were or what color you always wore or related to your favorite subject or sports team. Mine was…The most courageous Tiger. I remember feeling disappointed and a little embarrassed when they called my name for this award. I was a good student and very active in everything and this was the best thing they could say about me?!?!

I remember being an 11^th grader and going to church camp. I loved church camp. We would stay in college dorms with other kids from all over the US, swim, play pranks, do skits and enjoy watching/participating in the teenage drama and merriment that is 300 teens living together in community. Every year people would audition to sing in worship. I took chorus in high school and I sang solos sometimes at my church. I decided to try out on a whim. I made it. I somehow beat out like 20 other people for a solo I was so nervous, I knew I wasn’t the world’s best singer I just liked to sing here and there for fun. The background music was hard to hear in the giant auditorium. I lost my place a bit although I managed to save it by adding a repeat at the end. I got a standing ovation. Initially I was kind of excited thinking maybe I did a better job than I thought. After the service was over, people came up to me in tears about how beautiful it was me getting up there and all, walking up there without my wheelchair. One of the other churches actually wrote me a letter about it saying how much my Christ like example meant to them overcoming my disability and all. I left camp feeling annoyed and slightly used. I felt like I had been conned into being the camp’s resident POLLYANNA.

Two days ago I went to my post box and pulled out one of the tell-tell white envelopes that mean GRADES. Inside was my internal medicine grades and the all important comments (which will be summarized in my Dean’s letter for residency). And there in 12 point Arial font was the word perseverance as my leading strength. I just stared down with a sense of sincere disappointment. I had worked so hard on my differential diagnosis, my physical exam, my presentations, my medical knowledge. All the things you are supposed to learn on your int med rotation. Heck I may have bought myself hip surgery with this rotation. And all I got was another pat on the head for being the resident gimp. No one cares if there doctor perseveres, no residency program really cares at least not compared to my ability to take care of patients.. The last thing I needed was one more teacher/attending/authority figure to tell me I am dedicated, motivated and persevere almost to a fault. What I need is someone to tell me what my strengths as a clinician are, as a physician. Disappointing…