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Saturday, October 21, 2006


Feeling alittle down tonight, like I want to cry.
Don't quite know why.
I'm playing Dido now.
reflective,
solemn,
mellow.
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I saw a patient yesterday who was diagnosed with liver cancer and was told that she had 4 weeks left to live. She was only 40! To have survived the ordeal 1 year on and be present to tell me her incredibly touching story of survival and tremendously warm family support-I nearly lost it. I fought hard to blink away the tears.
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Then I saw another patient who wanted contact lenses because she was attending her friend's wedding. I noticed on the record card that she's my age, and I asked whether she's married too. She is infact, with 2 kids with her eldest son 4 years of age! Damn I felt so old. (Welcome to Bundaberg, where most people get hitched after high school, have kids and become pretty large-the highest rate of diabetes and obesity in the country according to a visiting endocrinologist).
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Chatted to Yao about obstacles in life, it's a depressing topic. I also told him about the innocence of a 14 year old patient whom I consulted yesterday. She was so bubbly, I remember smiling inwardly as she spoke, so childlike yet thinking she had everything figured out. Then it hit me that she was a splitting image of me 1o years ago.
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I can't believe it's nearly a DECADE since I was a fresh Macrob girl. Wasn't it just yesterday? I was shy then, very naive, very innocent, very eager, wide-eyed and not very confident. The time when living in Singapore was just a distant girly dream, when I had no clue about which career path I wanted to take (think it was graphic design), nor any clue about boys. Yao was a fair bit shorter than me and we all lived under one roof, with mum and dad looking much younger, and a silly but loveable dog named 'guardy' to play with. Our humble house was on a street lined with cherry blosoms that flower and bloom brilliantly in springtime, I remember shaking each tree branch after school and watching the delightful pink petals shower down like in a magical dream.
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Gosh, with all these reminiscing about the past, am I joining the chorus of 'old' people who sigh about years gone by? A decade indeed flashed by in an eye blink though. I sometimes wonder, whether I've been on a journey of self discovery that merely travelled in circles. How often do we look up and realise that we're back right where we've started?
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It's so easy to think we're invincible, when we're young and healthy. But really, life is too fragile. I just need to turn up to work to be reminded of this. Seeing old patients motivate me to eat and exercise well. Gotta be more positive, gotta treat this body with respect and make the most of my youth. Many patients tell me the same thing, 'one advice I give you, never ever ever grow old!!' Yeah like that's gonna to happen.
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As time flies by, you really start to wonder: what matters? What really matters??? What's the meaning of life if you can't share it with your loved ones? What precious memories will I have of myself 10 years on, what achievements will I have accomplished that will make me feel really proud? I just don't want to watch the hours tick by, day by day, and let it trickle by meaninglessly.
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I want it to mean something.

xiao ying @ 11:11 PM.

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