The Flip Side

The first thing medicine teaches you is that we ought to take care of ourselves. Avoid smoking, drinking too much, sleeping too little, too much stress, and overeating. Do all of the above and you tend to have better chances of not entering the hospital.

But it doesn't mean you have no chance. In fact every type of person comes in, including the health nuts. Sometimes we see people who live exemplary lives, who are well-informed about healthy habits and put in a lot of effort to take care of themselves. They get sick, too.

And, like,

I guess the second thing medicine teaches is that illnesses don't discriminate. They don't prey on the evil—they hit anyone and everyone. When you see someone a lot like you in the wards, it really hits close to home. She didn't think that she'd be warded for a rare disease. Just like I don't.

We think we're in control of a lot of things in life. If you take care of yourself, you won't get sick. If you were a good parent, your children won't abandon you. If you don't smoke, you don't get lung cancer.

The truth is that these are just illusions. Anyone can get anything. And I'm not saying this to cause fear or anxiety. Sometimes doing the best we can is all we can do; the rest is out of our control.

To people like me that does kind of make me anxious. It means that at some time in the future, terrible things that I didn't anticipate, didn't even imagine, might happen to me.

But the flip side is, I see the world a little differently. It means that people aren't always to blame for what happens to them. The basis of a meritocracy is: put in the effort, and you get the results. The other side of the coin is: if you're deep in muck, you deserved it. You didn't work hard, you bum.

But not always. Homeless people, abandoned parents—dear god, not always. It's not always their fault, you see. I understand that much, and I wish I could tell them. I wish I could tell her. It's not your fault. Please don't blame yourself.

This is perhaps the third thing that medicine teaches. Bad stuff doesn't always hit those who deserve it, and neither do good things only happen to the wise and kind. It's an uncomfortable truth.

I guess what I really want to ask the doctors I respect is, how are you still able to smile?

Roy Kim - love love love