Detachment; a learned trait in our health care system.

Ive always kinda thought that the people who work in health care were supposed to have an even stronger sense of human compassion. I mean there job is to give care right?

I understand about the word detachment, what it means and its purpose. I understand why its tought at some point in the fields where trama is a part of daily life. I understand that for a proffessional to do his or her job to the best of their ability it is important that they are able to disconnect on a personal level and when trama is your daily business a person needs to be able to leave there work where they work and not bring it home with them.

I think that just about all of us understand this and that it is just the way it goes. The part of life thats made up of happiness is nice but we all know that life is about a hell of alot more then just being happy.

This is kind of the way I see it, detachment has its place and is needed in many different senerios in life. But if a person is able to master this technique and have the ability to remove there own empathy at will whenever it suits them havent they in a sense learned how to become a sociopath? Isnt it kind of the same thing? I do not mean to suggest that all health care workers are sociopaths, I know better, I know many of them who are truly loving affectionate people.

I had an experience back in 2010 that kind of opened my eyes to the cold sad reality. I had a full on heart attack, a bad one, the main artery in my heart was completely blocked, they ended up putting two bare metal stents in my heart to open it back up. It was an experience like nothing Ive ever had. A pain that cannot be put into words, kind of like having a full cement truck parked on your chest. Our bodies need oxygen and when they dont get it for a period all kinds of bad things happen. Alot of the trouble we had was they could not get an I V in me, it was some what of a struggle but they finally got one in my arm pit. The whole ordeal seemed as though it took days.

When a person is in that kind of pain there is nothing in there mind that would be out of the question as far as getting it to stop. You suddenly find yourself trying to make a deal with God, “anything” to make it stop.

Through alot of this I dont really remember having any eye sight, things were pretty dark, but I was completely surrounded by health care workers, I could hear them all around me as well feel them while they had there hands on me: However I could not get not one of them to hold my hand. At times I begged and pleaded, I just wanted somebody to hold my hand. For hours this went on, I can remember actually reaching out and feeling around just trying to find someone who would hold my hand. It didnt happen, I never was able to get anyone to hold my hand. I asked why? why wont anybody hold my hand? silence is what I got back and no hand.

Finally I heard the words “here comes your morphine” and that was the last thing I remember. I was in surgery for the rest of the night. I came to the next morning, they had went through my femeral artery next to my groin with the apperatus they used to install the two stents, (back to back) in the main artery. I dont want to ever have to go through that again, it would be easier to just die. I am grateful that they saved my life but Ive always remembered and wondered about that night and why I couldnt get some human contact. I mean we are all human beings right? I guess what it was I was asking, begging for was just too personal, they were all just too detached. IDK

Bret Fifield