Bianca Ichim

“As medical students, we were confronted by death, suffering and the work entailed in patient care, while being simultaneously shielded from the real brunt of responsibility, though we could spot its specter. Med students spend the first two years in classrooms, socializing, studying and reading; it was easy to treat the work as a mere extension of undergraduate studies. But my girlfriend, whom I met in the first year of medical school, understood the subtext of the academics. Her capacity to love was barely finite, and a lesson to me. One night on the sofa in my apartment, while studying the reams of wavy lines that made up EKGs, she puzzled over, then correctly identified, a fatal arrhythmia. All at once, it dawned on her and she began to cry: wherever this “practice EKG” had come from, the patient had not survived. The squiggly lines on that page were more than just lines; they were ventricular fibrillation deteriorating to asystole, and they could bring you to tears.”
― Paul Kalanithi, NOT A A BOOK: When Breath Becomes Air

“A! E alta forma, o forma care, din punct de vedere estetic, nu este prea frumoasa! N-am sa inteleg niciodata de ce a arunca in oameni cu bombe, a-i omori in asediu reglementar este o forma mai respectabila? Teama de estetica este primul indiciu al neputintei!... Niciodata, niciodata n-am simtit-o mai bine ca acum, si inteleg mai putin ca oricand care este crima mea! Niciodata, niciodata n-am fost mai puternic si mai convins ca acum! [...]
Ar fi interesant de stiut daca in cei 15-20 de ani care vor urma sufletul meu se va potoli intr-atat incat sa scancesc smerit in fata oamenilor, numindu-ma, cand trebuie si cand nu trebuie, talhar? Da, da, intocmai! Pentru asta ma trimit ei la ocna, de asta au ei nevoie... Uite-i cum misuna pe strada incolo si incoace, si fiecare din ei este din firea lui un ticalos si un talhar; mai rau inca: este un idiot! Dar sa incerce numai sa nu ma trimita la ocna si ei toti au sa turbeze de nobila indignare! O, cat ii urasc pe toti!
Care este procesul care il va face pe el sa se supuna tuturora, fara sa mai stea sa judece, sa se supuna convins ca asa trebuie sa fie? De ce nu? Fireste, asa trebuie sa se intample! Oare 20 de ani de apasare necontenita nu-l vor frange definitiv? Apa sapa pietrele. Pentru ce, pentru ce atunci sa mai traiesc, pentru ce ma duc, daca stiu ca toate se vor intampla intocmai ca in carte si nu altfel?!"
De ieri isi punea poate pentru a suta oara aceasta intrebare si totusi mergea inainte.”
― Dostoyevsky (Author), Crime and Punishment

“Abram voia sã-și scoatã din creier flacãra galbenã, chinuitoare, și s-o zvîrle cît colo, dar flacãra stãtea cu îndãrãtnicie locului și pîrjolea tot ce se afla înãuntrul capului sãu, care-i ardea ca focul. Minutarul de gheațã din inimã dãdea rateuri, și ceasul vieții începea sã meargã într-un chip ciudat, de-a-ndoaselea ; frig în loc de fierbințealã simțea Abram trecîndu-i din zona capului cãtre picioare, micuța lumînare i se muta în cap, iar flacãra cea galbenã, în inimã, și trupul lui zdrobit ajunse pradã unui tremur mãrunt, pricinuit de malarie terțã, de extrasistole și în discordanțã cu metronomul vieții ; și atunci blana de oaie nu-i mai era de-ajuns și ar fi vrut sã umple tot cantonul, de jos pînã sus, cu blãnuri și sã se ghemuiascã acolo, pe culcuș de cãrãmizi încinse.”
― Bulgakov M.

“I am writing this with my left hand, although I am strongly right-handed. I had surgery to my right shoulder a month ago (…) and am not capable of use of the right arm at this time. I write slowly, awkwardly – but more easily, more naturally, with each passing day. I am adapting, learning, all the while – not merely this left-handed writing, but a dozen other left-handed skills as well: I have also become very adept, prehensile, with my toes, to compensate for having one arm in a sling. (…) I am developing different patterns, different habits… a different identity, one might say. There must be changes going on with some of the programs and circuits in my brain – altering synaptic weights and connectivities and signals (though our methods of brain imaging are too crude to show these).
(…)
Nature’s imagination is richer than ours (...). For me, as a physician, nature’s richness is to be studied in the phenomena of health and disease, in the endless forms of individual adaptation by which human organisms, people, adapt and reconstruct themselves, faced with the challenges and vicissitudes of life.

Defects, disorders, diseases, in this sense, can play a paradoxical role, by bringing out latent powers, developments, evolutions, forms of life, that might never be seen, or even be imaginable, in their absence. It is the paradox of disease, in this sense, its “creative” potential, that forms the central theme of this book.

Thus while one may be horrified of the ravages of developmental disorder or disease, one may sometimes see them as creative toon- for if they destroy particular paths, they may force the nervous system into making other paths and ways, force on it an unexpected growth and evolution. This other side of development or disease is something I see, potentially, in almost every patient; and it is this, here, which I am especially concerned to describe.
(…)
In addition to the objective approach of the scientist, the naturalist, we must employ an intersubjective approach too, leaping, as Foucault writes, “into the interior of morbid consciousness [trying] to see the pathological world with the eyes of the patient himself”.
(…)
The exploration of deeply altered selves and worlds is not one that can be made in a consulting room or office. The French neurologist Francois Lhermitte is especially sensitive to this, and instead of just observing his patients in the clinic, he makes a point of visiting them at home, taking them to restaurants of theatres, or for rides in his car, sharing their lives as much as possible.”
― Oliver Sacks