The Doctor/Wife Conundrum

Being a doctor is quite the balancing act. There is, of course, the issue of time allocation: how much time you spend studying, at work, at church, with family, resting, etc... That part has always been fairly easy, because it's a matter of priorities and family has always been first, followed by church, and lastly work.

What is infinitely more difficult is finding an emotional equilibrium between being caring and compassionate towards the patient while maintaining a certain amount of distance and objectivity. If there is too little feeling, you come off as cold and callous. Too much, and you run the risk of burning out; plus, it's harder to remain objective. As a physician, often you have to order a test, administer a treatment, or provide information that is painful in the short term but in a person's best interests in the long term. Objectivity requires looking at the situation and putting personal feelings aside, which is obviously harder to do if you've invested a lot of emotion.

When I was in residency, people told me that it was harder to be objective when it was with members of your own family. Well, they were wrong. It's not "harder," it's frankly impossible. I found that out today when Mike came down with the flu. He's had a cough since Tuesday and Wednesday night a low-grade fever began brewing. Around 1 AM this morning, he woke up with chills, rigors, and a fever of 104. He was absolutely miserable. I knew it was bad when he moaned every time he moved, but he really scared me when he actually asked me if he could take an ibuprofen.

Happily, things quieted down with the ibuprofen. I was pretty sure he had a case of the flu, but during a sleepless night in between 3:30 and 6:30 thoughts like, "What if he's developing pneumonia?" and "Could this be the beginning of meningitis?" began working their way through my incoherent brain. By the time I left for work, I was filled to the brim with anxiety. My "what ifs" were entering the realm of the ridiculous. "What if he gets worse to the point he has to be hospitalized but he won't let anyone poke him with needles?" "What if he faints and hits his head and is knocked unconscious?" "What if someone breaks into the house and Mike's too delirious with fever to do anything and the robber kills him?" "What if the fever never goes away and it turns out that this is a new virus that changes Mike into a zombie?"

Alright, maybe I hung onto sanity enough that the last "what if" didn't enter my head. The doctor part of me was saying that I was being absurd but the wife part of me couldn't help it! By the time I arrived at work, the physician part had taken hold and I had managed to talk myself down somewhat. I was on my way to a morning meeting when I ran into one of my attending physicians, Dr. Davis. She looked at my tired, haggard appearance and remarked that I looked like I'd been up all night. I told her I thought Mike had the flu. Her response, which I am not making up, was "Oh, that's really bad. When my husband had the flu, he got up to go to the bathroom then fainted, hit his head on the sink, and had a seizure. You should go home and be with him."

Oh my gosh!!! That was one of my "what ifs!!!" Any amount of objectivity I had left was thrown out the door. There was no more conundrum. It was 100% wife, 100% worried. I rushed to call Mike. No answer. I waited 4 whole minutes before calling again. No answer. This time, I only waited 2 minutes. No answer. So I rushed back to my car and en route, Mike called back. He was alive!!!

I wasted no time in booking an appointment with an objective provider, who did x-rays, a strep test, and a physical examination. The end result of all that was a confirmation of my original pre-insanity diagnosis: flu. We waited 1 hour in the pharmacy to get Tamiflu. Before we left the office, Dr. Carney made Mike wear "The Mask of Shame" so that no one else would get sick.
Look at those puppy dog eyes. It made me so sad. I'm so grateful for an understanding work that let me discard the doctor hat for awhile and completely be a wife. Objectivity is overrated.