A New Beginning

In "Bittersweet Bye" I shared the news that my wonderful internist was closing her medical practice. So last week I established myself with my children's internist. As much as I hated to leave the expert and compassionate care of my longtime physician, I enjoyed a few unexpected surprises.

1. My chart is skinny! For the past few years, every time I visited my internist, she lugged a 5-inch thick chart into the room along with her stethoscope. I always felt like we were updating a mountain of medical issues. My new internist's chart looks just like my ob-gyn's chart on me: a few tenths of an inch thick.
2. In just minutes, we summarized my eight separate courses of cancer treatment, their side effects and ongoing long-term effects. The process reminded me of how the seemingly endless pain of labor was almost forgotten as soon as I laid eyes on my healthy newborn: The pain and losses of the past 18 years of survivorship telescoped into a compact and unemotional "past medical history."
3. For the first time in my life, my primary care physician is much younger than me. Another milestone. Another reminder that I'm getting old. Yay. 

As a Healthy Survivor, I balance the grief of unwanted changes associated with aging by celebrating the fact that I am old enough to experience these losses.

Comments

[kate]

Wendy;

Wonderful post. I love the way you find the nuggets of gold in the midst of change, newness, and what would be for so many, very unsettling circumstances. I agree that it must be nice to see that "thin" chart again. Starting over. Nice.

[Wendy S. Harpham, MD]

Like any other skill, the more I've tried to look at the good sides of unwanted circumstances, the more naturally doing so has become.

Everything is not determined by genes. We can teach ourselves to become more flexible, more optimistic and, yes, even happier.

I must point out, as described in my March 20th post, I gave myself permission to openly grieve the loss. Those tears and discussions freed me to embrace the care of my new physician and to see the up sides.

With hope, Wendy

[Roz]

When my doctors and dentists retire, I now actively seek those younger folks who hopefully will be around for the rest of my life. It is very hard to make those changes from people you trust to new medical personnel

[Wendy S. Harpham, MD]

Dear Roz,

Exactly. The irony of my situation is that one of the reasons most of my patients chose me was that I was young, which made it especially hard on everyone when I closed my practice.

With hope, Wendy