Within my involvement in the Athena Institute program, I have learned about the value of death; it is not something to be feared, rather death is simply a natural part of life. Far too many people choose to run away from and avoid death at all costs, instead of choosing to find meaning in the time they have remaining. This is the most important lesson that I\u2019ve taken away from my Chaplain\/Volunteer Director: reaching a point of fulfillment with one\u2019s life is the way to achieve a \u201cgood\u201d death. One story that she told me that has really stuck with me was about one of her rapidly declining patients whose daughter was getting married the following weekend. When it seemed apparent that the mother would most likely not be alive for the wedding, she described to me how they created a small wedding ceremony ahead of time while she was still alive at her bedside. She was able to be at peace and feeling fulfilled by being able to see her daughter get married, she passed away later that afternoon. <\/p>\n
I have learned that being able to be there to support people through this final step of their life is somewhat incredible and truly reinforces my desire to pursue a career in medicine. People revere doctors; some believe that they are able to do the work of a god. However, I think that this mindset approaches medicine in all of the wrong ways. Doctors are in a unique position where they are able to support people in their most vulnerable state, and it is crucial to be a support and truly have the patient\u2019s best interest at heart, even if the information isn\u2019t what they want to hear. I\u2019ve learned that doctors shouldn\u2019t feel as though they need to avoid their patient\u2019s death at all costs \u2014 and that isn\u2019t really a life worth living, unless the patient truly desires to fight to the last minute. What I\u2019ve learned is that sometimes the best thing a patient can hear is that they can stop fighting, and that is the strongest decision a person can make. <\/p>\n
In one of the final assignments, I found a poem about death that resonated with me, and I selected John Donne\u2019s Holy Sonnet \u201cDeath, Be Not Proud,\u201d because it fully encapsulates the biggest lesson that I have learned from my time with the Athena Institute. Donne wrote, \u201cDeath, be not proud, though some have called thee \/ Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so,\u201d unpacking people\u2019s irrational fear of death, claiming that while some have called it \u201cmighty and dreadful,\u201d it actually isn\u2019t. As a metaphysical poet, Donne describes death as a \u201cshort sleep\u201d before \u201cwaking eternally,\u201d since his poetry is rooted in religion. However, instead of being taken literally, his message is, rather, that we are able to take back the control over our deaths, instead of fearing and avoiding the inevitable. <\/p>\n
This is one of the most important lessons that I will take with me as I continue onto my medical journey: the quality of a patient\u2019s life is almost always more important than the quantity of their life, unless they decide otherwise. Being a good doctor is being able to recognize when it is time to shift a patient\u2019s care from the focus of treatment to comfort. Because, at the end of the day, their ability to find comfort, meaning, and closure within the time that they have left is a life well lived. I want to take this lesson with me into my career in medicine, knowing that my role as a doctor is to provide care and comfort, not necessarily always with the aim of healing my patients; I will accept death as a part of life\u2019s journey, working alongside my patients to ultimately find the purpose that they desire from their lives.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Within my involvement in the Athena Institute program, I have learned about the value of death; it is not something to be feared, rather death is simply a natural part of life. Far too many people choose to run away from and avoid death at all costs, instead of choosing to find meaning in the … Continue reading “Reflections on the Value of Death, Life’s Meaning”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"school":[29],"program_year":[52],"class_list":["post-2138","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hospice","school-u-mich","program_year-52"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2138"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2138\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2279,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2138\/revisions\/2279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2138"},{"taxonomy":"school","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/school?post=2138"},{"taxonomy":"program_year","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/program_year?post=2138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}