Tag: empathy
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Give me a staff of honour for mine age
It’s interesting how we can find ourselves immersed in Time, isn’t it? We ride in it as if we were on a bus, looking out of the windows at the world going by. We are all on a journey I suppose, but some of us at different speeds and from different locations. Well, at least…
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The gift of accompaniment
I remember it from my medical practice; I remember it from dealing with friends with incurable illness: the feeling of helplessness in commiseration. The recognition that my often naïve suggestions, intended to help, were not what was required, nor even wanted, for that matter. Sometimes there are no solutions; sometimes presence –listening- in itself is…
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Look the other way, please.
There really are inconvenient truths, aren’t there? There are some things that seem to slip quietly under the radar -things that go unremarked until they are brought our our attention. And even then, they are perhaps dismissed as unimportant -or worse, accepted and rationalized in an attempt to justify them as tools that enable the…
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The Trigger Warning
Call me naive, if you will, or maybe even uninformed, but not insensitive. Not indifferent; I am neither. Unaware, perhaps comes closest. And, until recently, the concept of trigger warning was not one that I thought would have arisen in the day to day world of office gynaecology. But I was wrong. A trigger warning,…
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The Empathy of Age
I am intrigued by the concept of empathy. Variously defined as caring, psychological identification, or even sharing another person’s feelings, it is nevertheless a quality incumbent upon those of us in the health profession in whatever capacity. Empathy is a word that has, in some minds, become synonymous with other altruistic traits such as sympathy,…
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The Miracle (part 2): a woman’s story in 2 parts
“Emily.” It was the doctor’s voice, and he was leading her into a seat in his office as if she were an old lady. “Emily, it’s good to see you again…” his voice trailed off as he inspected her. “But you were supposed to have come back to see me a month or so ago,…
musings on women's health 