Transformation

In re-reading over some previous entries, I notice that my ponderous-thoughts tend to use sexy words like "enshroud" and "mystery" to describe the new classes and adventures I am introduced to in this process of becoming...

Let me take a moment to underscore that gross anatomy is gross.

Last Friday, we dissected the "perineum". What's that, you say? Perineum is akin to "private parts", "unmentionables", or my personal favorite "baby makers"; all euphamisms for the penis, the scorutum, the clitoris, the vagina, and the anus.

This lab was doomed both to fail and to leave permanent scars on the psyches of all my first year classmates. First, the lab didn't get posted until the last minute, meaning that no one was able to prepare by reading grey's anatomy and at least being empowered with facts. Second, our time was cut in half, meaning that we had to rush through a three hour lab in 90 minutes.

Next, these "private areas" are very difficult to gain access to; to even "open" up the area requires raising the cadaver onto plastic blocks, and putting the legs into the "spread eagle" position. But wait, there's more. Because of the overall stiffness of each cadaveor from the embalming process, the legs have to be tied down with rope and secured to the ends of table in order to keep the cadaveor in a somewhat function-fitting position.

Got that image in your mind? Then, we were ready to begin...

Up until this lab, gross anatomy had been somewhat of a detached experience. Work in any given area allowed you to drape the rest of the body with cloth, much like surgeons do, in order to disconnect yourself from the whole person. We instead focus on the smaller structual anatomy, and feel incresingly confident in our chosen career path as we master nerve plexi and muscle function.

But Friday, much like our special lady, our emotions and insecurities lay exposed for everyone to see. No longer capable or in control, visceral emotions took over. Julia found herself struggling to contain her laugher while Sam struggled to contain his breakfast. We muddled through the lab, and mutually decided to skip over instructions such as "palpate the clitoris" or "insert two fingers into the vagina to simulate a bimanual exam". As Spencer remarked, "Thanks, but no thanks... I don't want to add 'fingering a dead lady' to my list of medical school firsts."

Later, out of the anatomy lab, I felt sick to my stomach. Long after the smell of formaldehyde had left my skin, the feeling remained that I had done something brutish, invasive, and disrespectful. I went back over each moment of the lab in detail; what I had said, what I had felt - what in the world had gone on in there? It was perhaps the first time since getting going that I paused to reflect on what a crazy thing it was that I was doing in this class - I had chosen to become a doctor to heal, hand't I? What was happening to me instead?

Unable to concentrate, I went back up to the lab. Alone in the morgue-like room I stood with our lady and tried to remember what she had looked like when I first saw her. Most of her skin is now detached, and her muscles, stolen of their protective covering, have begun to dessicate. In the quiet, I let my thoughts wander to people that she had loved, places she had lived. What had she seen in her life? What had she enjoyed? Her fingernails are covered with delicate pink nail polish - I hoped that it was a signal of the love which had been given to her by a caretaker.

What promted me to do what I did next, I am not sure. Maybe it is that deeper inner feeling - that still small voice - the one that has pushed me to stay on this life path. Maybe it was to attempt a reconcilliation from the "invasion" that was Friday. Or maybe it was only a moment in which I realized that this woman is not so different from the other grandmother like women I have loved.

Over the next hour, I wrapped each section of her muscles in damp cloth and then sutured her skin where it had been cut open. At the end, aside from the occasional patches of clumsily woven stiches, I could recognize her as I did that first day.


I turned out the lights to leave, and felt releaved. Despite this transformative indroduction to the profession, I can still recognize myself.