Writing CrazinessMy crooked path toward a writing career

by Melissa Yi/Yuan-Innes/Yuan/Yin

First Plan: Artist/Ballerina

Turned out I liked tutus more than ballet.

Stubborna.k.a. Don’t make me point at the mermaid

“A woman writer must have an imagination that is plain stubborn, that can invent new gods and banish ineffectual ones.” -Yvonne Vera, Zimbabwean author

Germany=writing

When I was ten, my parents moved me to foreign country withfew English books. I was an outcast. Solution? Write.

Permission to Write“Who gave you permission to be a poet?” Jim White, quoted by Natalie Goldberg in Wild Mind

My answer: Matt, my high school boyfriend.

University of everything

'If you don't know where you are going, any road can take you there.' ― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

For university, I studied the Arts and Sciences and Psychology. And dressed up as Odysseus’s Penelope for Hallowe’en.

“I’ll just be a doctor AND a writer. It’ll give me something to write about.” --Me, fourth year

I wrote about music and cadavers, won 2nd place in Writers of the Future & attended a professional writing workshop in Oregon. With a dancing cow.

I could have worked toward a contract to write a medical “for Dummies” book.

“Skin Song”

Instead, I wrote about a girl who could tell the future using popcorn.

I wrote vampires & wizards

Bonobo-human hybrids...

I sold some stories and poems, won a few awards, but couldn’t get a traditional New York book contract. I wanted a time machine so I could go after that Dummies book. Why was I writing so many stories no one would read?

Still, I kept writing. Stubborn.It wasn’t until I graduated that I could write about medicine.

“JUST READ MY CHART from last night,” said the irri-tated patient, an elderly man.

I pointed at the current ER chart on my clipboard. “Your previous records haven’t arrived yet. I know from your triage note that you had a bloody nose and you were here last night, but it’s no longer bleeding. So, what did they do for you last night?”

“Just read my chart,” he repeated indignantly.

“I don’t have your chart, sir. It’s at medical records and it will take a while to come. Could you tell me what kind of treatment you received?”

“Just. Read. My. Chart.”I changed the subject: “Are

you taking any medications?”“I’m healthy,” he said.Not wanting to explain that

many people feel healthy but take medications, I continued trying to ask questions: “Are you taking any blood thinners,

like Coumadin, or antiplatelet medications, such as Aspirin or Plavix?”

“I’m healthy!”“So that’s a no, then?”“NO! I’M HEALTHY.”Just before giving up and

moving on to the physical exam, I decided to entreat him one last time: “Sir, it takes time to get your old charts and sometimes they get lost. It’s in your own best interest to explain what happened and

what medications you take.”He didn’t answer. I looked

up his nose, which still wasn’t bleeding, and decided to insert some Gelfoam to prevent any problem and thereby discour-age him from coming back on my shift.

When I walked back to the central nursing station, which was surrounded by 13 stretch-ers full of patients waiting for me, the elderly man hollered for all to hear: “You are the

most unfeeling doctor I have ever met!”

I paused and considered walking back to talk to him, but decided to get on with more pressing matters instead. I had to finish seeing all the ambulatory patients and close down this department of the emergency room before I could go home. An hour later, I did go back to check the elderly man’s nose again but his condi-tion hadn’t changed.

A teaching moment?Buddhists believe life is your best teacher. So that abusive patient was supposed to be my teacher, but it made me mad to think of him that way.

A few days later, I told my book club about the incident and concluded: “So I had to finish my shift, knowing that every other patient in the room thought I was a heartless doctor.”

“No,” two of my friends said. “If I heard a patient like that, I’d feel sorry for the doctor.”

Another friend laughed and said, “I. Love. Your. Stories!”

For the first time, I saw that it was kind of funny.

In the end, I decided that if I were to treat someone like that elderly man again, I’d say: “I can see you’re angry. So, you can be angry at me, but I’m not angry at you.”

Sure, I may come off as a New Age fruitcake, but at least I would be showing him com-passion instead of, say, wanting to offer him another nosebleed.

Hey, look at me, I’m enlight-ened already!

Melissa Yuan-Innes is an emer-gency physician in Cornwall and Alexandria, Ont. For more of her writing, go to www.melissayuaninnes.net.

60 APRIL 20, 2010 CanadianHealthcareNetwork.ca THE MEDICAL POST

last laugh

Channel your inner Buddha to achieve peace with patientsWhen the ER is fraught with angry patients, just enlighten up

by Melissa Yuan-Innes

Dav

e W

ham

ond

Dear Dr. Lifestyle,Can you please explain what is

meant by the term “professionalism” as it applies to physicians?—Dr. Dee Nyle, Toronto

Dear Dr. Dee,Alas, I wish I could. I must confess to

being completely mystified as to what is meant by professionalism. Everybody has a different definition, and most of them are contradictory. For example, the Canadian Medical Association defines professionalism as “those skills, attitudes and behaviours we have come to expect” from physicians, but then goes on to say these include ethical behaviour, integrity, honesty and altruism; this is clearly inconsistent. If the CMA can’t figure out what it means to be a professional, what hope is there for the rest of us?

In practical terms, professionalism is usually

defined as the opposite of unprofes-sionalism. While nobody knows what being professional entails, everybody has an opinion about what it means to be unprofessional. For example, wear-ing a stylish black miniskirt, large hoop earrings and a T-shirt that says “Foxy Doc” to clinic is apparently unprofes-

sional. You may think the concern arises because of the potential

for dishonesty but, no, even if one actually is a Foxy Doc, it is still considered unprofes-sional. Go figure.

I wonder, Dr. Dee, if your interest in this topic arises from being told a few too many times that you yourself were

unprofessional, possibly when you arrived a half hour late for rounds, left your pager at the spa again or made a pass at that security guard who really looked much older than 21. Dr. Life-style would like to use strong language in encouraging you to get your you-know-what together, but those prud-ish editors at the Medical Post would just edit it out. (Editor’s note: We’re goody-goody, not prudish.) Besides, heaven knows I would never want to be unprofessional.

Have a stylish day!

Lara Hazelton, a.k.a. Dr. Lifestyle, also doles out good advice in her psychiatry practice in Halifax.

Defining a ‘professional’

attitude

BAD ADVICE

MP07_060.indd 60 04/14/2010 02:51:12 PM

Medical non-fiction, too.The Medical Post was very, very good to me.

CBCThe publishing world was in upheaval, so I stubbornly approached the CBC. They offered me a contract for a pilot radio drama. Finally, my dreams were coming true!

Except they didn’t end up producing it. And then the whole radio drama department was cancelled. Note to self: public radio in upheaval, too. Also, arts cuts BAD.

I took control.

Became Kobo’s Cover Girl.

Still working. Still writing.Over! Under! Through! Grover version

As for my high school boyfriend? Reader, I married him.