Selfless strangers

Dressed in maroon, half masks on so you can’t see full faces, just eyes, kind tired eyes—concern writ large on their foreheads

And so, last week I fell badly, tearing my rotator cuff—that’s the tendon that connects the muscle to the shoulder. I wish it had been a more heroic way to tear a shoulder tendon—diving to stop a cricket ball, or pulling someone out of harms way. But no such luck, water had collected beneath a bath mat, and as it happens, you cartwheel through the air a la Charlie Chaplin or Jackie Chan—you think the worst, but instinct kicks in… protect, protect, protect—a split second is all you have, to differentiate between a back and a brain injury. So, you take the load on the shoulder. An MRI scan gave me the grave news that this was a serious tear. No steroid injections, no physio, would suffice… surgery was the only solution, my orthopaedic surgeon informed me, “Dikra, Arthroscopy, is the modern way. Won’t have to cut you open… two small incisions, arm in a sling for two months”.

I love hospitals, not that I’m given to morbidity, but you witness humanity at its core. All the high-tech equipment in the world can never replace heightened empathy. The Hippocratic Oath on display at every moment. 

As I lay there in the operation theatre, about to go into anaesthesia, watching everything from a low angle POV, doctors and nurses going about their business, patients’ lives in their hands, the collective focus required for an operation, the helter skelter of a hospital, the hurly burly of healing, many things hit me, as consciousness gave way to unconsciousness and then recovery.

Dressed in maroon, half masks on so you can’t see full faces, just eyes, kind tired eyes—concern writ large on their foreheads. A continuous flow of giving.

It is a thankless job, and we are not always a grateful people, entitlement in our DNA, and families who pull rank—we demand and we “dhamki” and we relentlessly “Do you know I am and do you know who my father is?” And if you’re seriously sleep deprived, you’ve been on your feet for twelve hours, you can’t care about who “your” father is, you have to give relief and a dose of Restil.

These are anonymous worker bees, from Vellore, and Valsad and Vizag and Mangalore, and Mazagon and Chembur, armed with BP machines, and Blood sugar monitors, and tissues and gauzes, they’ve committed their lives to healing, and at an early age they’ve made a commitment to helping people, with pretty much no expectation. 

It is 2.20 am, a patient is up, mistaking the hospital for a hotel.

Sure enough… “I am a donor, do you know who I am, I demand to talk to your superior”.

“Did you get any sleep last night,” I ask Priya from Valsad as she comes in to administer a pain killer.
“No sir, it was a busy night.”
“You’re a good doctor,” I tell her. 
“And you are a good patient—that you asked me if I got any sleep, made my day.” 

The question, as I hover between sleep and sleeplessness, is, in all the selflessness, is there satisfaction? Did you Priya from Valsad, and Revathy from Mangalore, did you fully sign up for a full smile on a diet of no sleep and full on stress?

All I can say is, thank you.

Rahul daCunha is an adman, theatre director/playwright, photographer and traveller. Reach him at rahul.dacunha@mid-day.com

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