"I think," I said in what I hoped was a very measured tone, "that one of the hardest things about this job is how unpredictabe it is." My coworker agreed without skipping a beat. She had watched me return to the office twice in a row, only to be called right as I walked in, feet away from my desk, and asked to go out to another part of the hospital. In between the first and second, there'd been a third call, but that time I only made it to the stairwell. Which begs the question "Why were you even trying? Why not just stay put?"
The answer is that I was trying because you just never know. Often I'll wait after an encounter ends, hang around in a random hallway and see if I'll get another call. Sometimes I do, other times I don't. Sometimes I wait around for 20 minutes, afraid of looking lazy in comparison to all the busy nurses and techs and maintenance people walking past me. But I'm not lazing about - waiting is just part of my workflow. But you never know how long it's going to be. It's like waiting for the bus and not being sure what the traffic pattern is like at the moment. Or like checking facebook to see if you have any notifications. When, and where, and how intensely I have to work is not under my control. Period. One minute I might be making sure someone explains medication dosing so they can go home, the next moment I might be giving a worried mom an explanation for why her child is suddenly in the ICU. You just never know. And you might have 2 minutes between calls, or you might have 40.
And now I'm starting to wonder if training myself to jump to it when there's a call is bleeding over into the rest of my life. First I realized that it's impossible to do any task that requires lengthy concentration during my breaks at work. I would go in thinking "I'm going to work on building this presentation today!" and leave berating myself for having done exactly nothing. But the reality is that for a creative task like that, you - or at least, I - need time to muster the concentration and mental resources it requires. I can't just dive in for 5 minutes, or 10, and be productive. So I moved to tasks that I don't have to really settle into to get going: looking up places to get good used tires for my car, reading facebook articles I'd saved for later, that kind of thing.
But now I'm also noticing that it's become harder for me to sit down and concentrate. In my free time I've become liable to rushing around, distracted, cleaning things here and there, thinking of things I should be doing, trying to make lists and only half succeeding, thinking of things I could be doing... it's been increasingly difficult to settle down. What a curious thing, no? I'm not sure how much of this I can really blame on the job. For one thing, I'm sure other people feel like this. Moms, and people who keep very busy. And I'm sure lots of different things can make someone more scatterbrained than usual. But me, I really enjoy concentrating, and am craving centeredness. I'm thinking I need to start some practices that will help me concentrate, settle in to something, and do it well.
Wednesday, November 29, 2017
Thursday, November 16, 2017
On the Fruit of Thanksgiving
Sometimes interpreters have to say horrible things. The same horrible things that doctors and nurse practitioners have to say. And when we do, when we as a medical team give bad news, we get to be at to be there in the big, scary moments where people forget themselves - or rather, decide that other people's eyes and opinions don't matter in light of the magnitude of what they're feeling - and react.
One time, I helped tell a matriarch and her family that her grandchild would likely be lost to her. She contained herself until everything had been said, and then let loose her grief. When she did, she began sobbing and praying in the same breath. And where I might have expected her to plead with God for her child's life, as I have seen many people do, she instead began giving heart-wrenching thanks. "Thank you Papito Dios for my children. Thank you Papito Dios for letting me hold him in my arms yesterday. Thank you Papito Dios for the time you gave me with him. Gracias, gracias..." she continued.
Her family rose instantly from their chairs to surround her, and in that clump of sobbing, grieving, praying people I saw the fruit of a long-standing relationship between this woman and her God. It floored me. She must have practiced thanking him for everything she could think of for years. It must be a very routine, normal thing for her to find something to say "thank you" for in the face of difficult, hard circumstances - otherwise how could she have done it in this, her moment of deepest pain?
And the way she addressed God was so familiar and deeply affectionate. A rough English translation would be "Daddy God," but in English, the word "daddy" is mostly used by young children, so it carries a sense of childishness. People pray this way in English too. The idea is that Jesus addressed God in the Biblical text as "Abba," and because through Jesus' sacrifice and resurrection people who choose to follow him have been grafted into God's family as children, they can now call God "Abba" as well. It is translated as "daddy," in English, but it still makes me a little uncomfortable. It sounded even more odd to me in Spanish though, because "papito" in Spanish isn't used in the same context as "Daddy," it isn't used by children. It's actually an affectionate way for parents to refer to children or older women to younger men. She had taken this word "papito" that is usually semi-parental and flipped it. Suddenly it meant "dear daddy God" instead of "little man." Because it's such an everyday word, and because of how easily it rolled off her tongue, it sounded both deeply intimate and well-worn. It sounded like it carried the undercurrent of love you might hear in a pet name used by a couple that's been happily married for 40 years.
For me, hearing her give thanks in such an intimate way to someone she considers to be in control of everything that happens, including this loss, cut me to the heart. And the way she was doing it, too. She was verbalizing the good thing that was being lost and expressing thanks for it in the midst of its being taken away, all toward a being she considers to be in control of both the giving and the loss. She wasn't asking for it back, or asking for the loss not to happen. Not that she won't - this was just her first reaction to the news. But this being her first reaction to her possible loss made her pain more poignant to me, clarified and sharpened it. And I think what shocked me about it was that it displayed such a soft heart, unembittered by the other pains of life thus far. How had she remained so unhardened by cynicism and bitterness, especially toward God, despite surely having already lived through a lot of the usual suffering?
It is almost Thanksgiving here in the United States, a time of year we set aside to be intentionally grateful. Here, my friends, was the fruit of faith that has been mixed with consistent gratitude. I don't fully know what kept this woman's heart soft, but I'm confident that gratitude had a lot to do with it. We take one day each year to focus on being grateful. But in this woman I saw an openness to love and a resilience to pain that can come from making gratitude a consistent habit.
I am grateful for the lesson, and hope to practice it myself.
One time, I helped tell a matriarch and her family that her grandchild would likely be lost to her. She contained herself until everything had been said, and then let loose her grief. When she did, she began sobbing and praying in the same breath. And where I might have expected her to plead with God for her child's life, as I have seen many people do, she instead began giving heart-wrenching thanks. "Thank you Papito Dios for my children. Thank you Papito Dios for letting me hold him in my arms yesterday. Thank you Papito Dios for the time you gave me with him. Gracias, gracias..." she continued.
Her family rose instantly from their chairs to surround her, and in that clump of sobbing, grieving, praying people I saw the fruit of a long-standing relationship between this woman and her God. It floored me. She must have practiced thanking him for everything she could think of for years. It must be a very routine, normal thing for her to find something to say "thank you" for in the face of difficult, hard circumstances - otherwise how could she have done it in this, her moment of deepest pain?
And the way she addressed God was so familiar and deeply affectionate. A rough English translation would be "Daddy God," but in English, the word "daddy" is mostly used by young children, so it carries a sense of childishness. People pray this way in English too. The idea is that Jesus addressed God in the Biblical text as "Abba," and because through Jesus' sacrifice and resurrection people who choose to follow him have been grafted into God's family as children, they can now call God "Abba" as well. It is translated as "daddy," in English, but it still makes me a little uncomfortable. It sounded even more odd to me in Spanish though, because "papito" in Spanish isn't used in the same context as "Daddy," it isn't used by children. It's actually an affectionate way for parents to refer to children or older women to younger men. She had taken this word "papito" that is usually semi-parental and flipped it. Suddenly it meant "dear daddy God" instead of "little man." Because it's such an everyday word, and because of how easily it rolled off her tongue, it sounded both deeply intimate and well-worn. It sounded like it carried the undercurrent of love you might hear in a pet name used by a couple that's been happily married for 40 years.
For me, hearing her give thanks in such an intimate way to someone she considers to be in control of everything that happens, including this loss, cut me to the heart. And the way she was doing it, too. She was verbalizing the good thing that was being lost and expressing thanks for it in the midst of its being taken away, all toward a being she considers to be in control of both the giving and the loss. She wasn't asking for it back, or asking for the loss not to happen. Not that she won't - this was just her first reaction to the news. But this being her first reaction to her possible loss made her pain more poignant to me, clarified and sharpened it. And I think what shocked me about it was that it displayed such a soft heart, unembittered by the other pains of life thus far. How had she remained so unhardened by cynicism and bitterness, especially toward God, despite surely having already lived through a lot of the usual suffering?
It is almost Thanksgiving here in the United States, a time of year we set aside to be intentionally grateful. Here, my friends, was the fruit of faith that has been mixed with consistent gratitude. I don't fully know what kept this woman's heart soft, but I'm confident that gratitude had a lot to do with it. We take one day each year to focus on being grateful. But in this woman I saw an openness to love and a resilience to pain that can come from making gratitude a consistent habit.
I am grateful for the lesson, and hope to practice it myself.
Sunday, September 24, 2017
looking back
One day it occurred to me to ask my Dad what it was like going to the doctor when we lived in Spain:
"Your mother took you to most appointments after a while. Especially the emergency ones. She spoke the language better. I had to have a colonoscopy once, and there was a hospital where there was just one doctor who spoke English. It was really far away, but I went there anyway, because you know, for something that important, you want to be able to understand what they're saying to you."
This, coming from my American, white, middle-class, male father, who spent 3 years in language school when we moved to Spain. I'm not sure what other layer of privilege you could find to add to that list - by any account, he should've had it easy. Plus, my father is a smart man. He now works in think tanks on things that I barely understand, and collaborates with people in his field literally around the globe. Even so, back in Spain he avoided encountering the medical field, and when he did his access to care was severely restricted by language.
We have to quit faulting people for not being able to communicate with us like native speakers when they're not. My Dad learned Spanish. He worked hard, for years. It was literally the main focus of his work week for the first several years we were living in country. But as an adult, there are, simply put, limits to what you can learn, no matter how hard you try. Plus, you learn language based on the context you need it for. So if you're not in and out of the doctor's office all the time, chances are you won't learn the specific language skills you need for that context, so that even if you're "fluent" for the purposes of everyday life, you're flummoxed in clinic.
My Dad didn't have access to an interpreter, so I couldn't ask him what that was like. But to his and my mother's credit, they never tried to make my sister or myself serve as their quasi-interpreters. Just as well, because we weren't learning language for the medical context either.
"Your mother took you to most appointments after a while. Especially the emergency ones. She spoke the language better. I had to have a colonoscopy once, and there was a hospital where there was just one doctor who spoke English. It was really far away, but I went there anyway, because you know, for something that important, you want to be able to understand what they're saying to you."
This, coming from my American, white, middle-class, male father, who spent 3 years in language school when we moved to Spain. I'm not sure what other layer of privilege you could find to add to that list - by any account, he should've had it easy. Plus, my father is a smart man. He now works in think tanks on things that I barely understand, and collaborates with people in his field literally around the globe. Even so, back in Spain he avoided encountering the medical field, and when he did his access to care was severely restricted by language.
We have to quit faulting people for not being able to communicate with us like native speakers when they're not. My Dad learned Spanish. He worked hard, for years. It was literally the main focus of his work week for the first several years we were living in country. But as an adult, there are, simply put, limits to what you can learn, no matter how hard you try. Plus, you learn language based on the context you need it for. So if you're not in and out of the doctor's office all the time, chances are you won't learn the specific language skills you need for that context, so that even if you're "fluent" for the purposes of everyday life, you're flummoxed in clinic.
My Dad didn't have access to an interpreter, so I couldn't ask him what that was like. But to his and my mother's credit, they never tried to make my sister or myself serve as their quasi-interpreters. Just as well, because we weren't learning language for the medical context either.
Thursday, August 24, 2017
the suction valve
I sat in the dentist's chair, waiting for the lidocaine to kick in. Maybe, I thought, it would also numb the dread I was feeling about what was about to happen.
Before he left, the doctor had handed me the little suction valve, and told me to use it whenever I needed. As I used it, I felt worse and worse. In a moment, I realized that the sound was making me flash back to the day before...
I'd been in the room with a chronically ill patient, in the ICU. Once again, we were all gowned up in our banana-colored reverse paper bathrobes, making us look both serious and ridiculous. A doctor was there doing a test where he had to use a long wand with a camera at the end to look into the child's sinuses. Given her condition, it was terribly painful for her. Another doctor, who had just happened to stop by, was in the back giving him advice. The child life specialist and the child's mother both held her hands and kept up a stream of encouraging (and distracting) words to help her through it. He couldn't get the scope up there, and we all dawdled through an agonizing 3 minutes of waiting for the nurse to get some forceps. He extracted a giant booger, and, in a classic "Scalpel!" moment, tried to hand the forceps (and their disgusting prize) to me. I drew back. More than being grossed out (which, YEAH, gross), I had no idea what I was supposed to do with the thing. He looked confused. The RN stepped in to save me. Thank God!
He continued his procedure. I couldn't keep my eyes or my mind off of what it must feel like to be that little kid. But this guy clearly considered everyone in the room to be there for him, because next thing you know he was asking Mom to push a button on his fancy machine. I didn't know if I should be impressed by the way he was drawing us all in, turning us into a team, or angered by his self-absorption.
And all through it, Mom and the CLS are holding the patient's hands, trying to draw her focus:
"No te muevas, no te muevas!" (Don't move, don't move!)
"Just hold my hand. Deep breaths. Think of the beach. Think of being at the beach with your mom, and your baby sister..."
"No te muevas, que si no te va a lastimar." (Don't move, otherwise it will hurt)
In time with their entreaties, the doctor kept using the suction valve. At one point, he couldn't see once he got the camera into the sinuses either, and ended up sticking it up through her nose into her sinus cavities, where it made the terrible squelchy sucking noises suction valves make when they do find a fluid to clean up.
That one encounter took the wind out of me yesterday. It was absurd, and horrible, and chaotic, and so mundane.
She was so sick, and miserable, and there were so many doctors and nurses poking and prodding her, like it was a matter of course. The juxtaposition between Mom's threatening "comfort" and the CLS's attempts to distract and calm the child nearly drove me up a wall. How could I interpret this to the CLS so it would communicate and not just add to the chaos? Was it worth trying? Would it change anything? I tried. Was she even listening? Add in the terrible sucking noises of the suction. The whole scene was frenetic and absurd and terribly serious. I couldn't figure out how, but I know I could've laughed at the whole thing if it hadn't been so gut-wrenching.
So there I am in the dentist's office, listening to the suction and suddenly thinking, "It's good to be in the patient's chair sometimes, to remind me what this feels like. I wish I had some hands to hold, too. Instead I'll try to hug myself with my own arms, my climber's arms that won't reach round my waist, but can hold on to my sides as if they were a medium edge on a wall... Oh WHAT is he doing in there? Be careful!!"
At least she had someone holding her hands.
At least I'm not real sick, just in need of a quick filling.
I guess we all have things to be grateful for.
Before he left, the doctor had handed me the little suction valve, and told me to use it whenever I needed. As I used it, I felt worse and worse. In a moment, I realized that the sound was making me flash back to the day before...
I'd been in the room with a chronically ill patient, in the ICU. Once again, we were all gowned up in our banana-colored reverse paper bathrobes, making us look both serious and ridiculous. A doctor was there doing a test where he had to use a long wand with a camera at the end to look into the child's sinuses. Given her condition, it was terribly painful for her. Another doctor, who had just happened to stop by, was in the back giving him advice. The child life specialist and the child's mother both held her hands and kept up a stream of encouraging (and distracting) words to help her through it. He couldn't get the scope up there, and we all dawdled through an agonizing 3 minutes of waiting for the nurse to get some forceps. He extracted a giant booger, and, in a classic "Scalpel!" moment, tried to hand the forceps (and their disgusting prize) to me. I drew back. More than being grossed out (which, YEAH, gross), I had no idea what I was supposed to do with the thing. He looked confused. The RN stepped in to save me. Thank God!
He continued his procedure. I couldn't keep my eyes or my mind off of what it must feel like to be that little kid. But this guy clearly considered everyone in the room to be there for him, because next thing you know he was asking Mom to push a button on his fancy machine. I didn't know if I should be impressed by the way he was drawing us all in, turning us into a team, or angered by his self-absorption.
And all through it, Mom and the CLS are holding the patient's hands, trying to draw her focus:
"No te muevas, no te muevas!" (Don't move, don't move!)
"Just hold my hand. Deep breaths. Think of the beach. Think of being at the beach with your mom, and your baby sister..."
"No te muevas, que si no te va a lastimar." (Don't move, otherwise it will hurt)
In time with their entreaties, the doctor kept using the suction valve. At one point, he couldn't see once he got the camera into the sinuses either, and ended up sticking it up through her nose into her sinus cavities, where it made the terrible squelchy sucking noises suction valves make when they do find a fluid to clean up.
That one encounter took the wind out of me yesterday. It was absurd, and horrible, and chaotic, and so mundane.
She was so sick, and miserable, and there were so many doctors and nurses poking and prodding her, like it was a matter of course. The juxtaposition between Mom's threatening "comfort" and the CLS's attempts to distract and calm the child nearly drove me up a wall. How could I interpret this to the CLS so it would communicate and not just add to the chaos? Was it worth trying? Would it change anything? I tried. Was she even listening? Add in the terrible sucking noises of the suction. The whole scene was frenetic and absurd and terribly serious. I couldn't figure out how, but I know I could've laughed at the whole thing if it hadn't been so gut-wrenching.
So there I am in the dentist's office, listening to the suction and suddenly thinking, "It's good to be in the patient's chair sometimes, to remind me what this feels like. I wish I had some hands to hold, too. Instead I'll try to hug myself with my own arms, my climber's arms that won't reach round my waist, but can hold on to my sides as if they were a medium edge on a wall... Oh WHAT is he doing in there? Be careful!!"
At least she had someone holding her hands.
At least I'm not real sick, just in need of a quick filling.
I guess we all have things to be grateful for.
Wednesday, July 26, 2017
Informed Consent
It would be my last call of the day. I didn't really want to go - I'd been dispatching all afternoon, when my coworker called me and passive-aggressively asked if I knew that we were now closing dispatch at 3:30 instead of 4. She didn't say so, but knowing her, she wanted me to take the call that had just come in. We had to go in order, and if I didn't get back in the pool, she'd be up next. I fumed in the hallway as I waited for the elevator about how bossy she was, but the second I arrived on scene, I was grateful I'd come.
At the bedside, along with about 3 nurses, was a handsome, strong-looking young surgeon practically shouting at a similarly young, strong-looking brown man in a hospital bed. "USTED PUEDE COMER COSAS COMO CAMARONES, MARISCO?" I was impressed by his decent vocabulary and grammar, but he looked pretty intimidating. I wasn't sure yet if this was my patient, but decided I didn't care. There was a good chance it was, and either way, this man deserved better communication. So I approached the bed and, projecting my voice above the machines, side-conversations, and the loud surgeon said, "Need an interpreter?" One of the nurses turned around and said, "Oh, perfect timing!" - as if I'd arrived by accident. I wondered who had requested an interpreter, and, for the millionth time, why most everyone else seemed to think they could do without one. The surgeon said, with relief on his face, "Oh, great, yeah, here's someone who's trained, let the professional do it." He sped off and I took his place at the head of the bed. Clearly someone had strongarmed him into helping them "get by." Still, I was grateful for his endorsement.
The nurses took him through their usual pre-operative questions: are you allergic to anything? when was the last time you ate or drank anything? etc. The surgeon came by with the signed consent to say that there were "a few things I had to add, and I need you to initial them - unfortunately they make me do that". He was apologetic, I think because the man found it so difficult to use his hands. Obviously, whoever had gone through the consent initially had done a rush job.
In case you're not familiar with consents for surgery, a consent contains several key elements: benefits of, risks of, and alternatives to the procedure are the most basic ones. The forms I've interpreted also often contain a diagnosis, who's performing the procedure, consent to receive blood if necessary, and disclaimers about video/camera recording and student presence in the operating room, among other things. Whoever had filled this consent out with the patient initially had forgotten to write in three things: the benefits of surgery, the name of the surgeon, and under risks, the possible need for further surgery. So we briefly went through the consent again. The doctor explained that the benefits would be to reduce pain and prevent the joint from stiffening, that it would require putting in a plate and some screws to keep the bones in place, and they would stay in for life, and that the patient might need further surgery at some point, but they couldn't predict that. This last is a blanket disclaimer that often gets thrown in as a way of saying, "something might go wrong at some future point, and you might need surgery again for it" It really doesn't mean anything more than "the future is unpredictable".
Our man initialed, painstakingly, in the places he was shown, and we continued to prep for surgery. The nurse stuck a Q-tip with a nasty looking brown substance up his nostrils to disinfect them, and had him brush his teeth with a mysterious liquid from a brown bottle. Finally she bent over him and asked, "Sir, do you have any questions for us?" Maybe it was something about her kind touch, or maybe he'd just had time while he was being disinfected to think about what he'd heard. In any case, he spoke up. "Si. Yo quiero saber porque no me entablillaron la mano, porque la verdad que prefiero que no me hagan esta operacion, pienso que seria mejor regresar a Mejico y encontrar un cura-huesos que me sane." He said more, but that was as far as I got in English before the nurse looked at me sternly and said, "So we need to get the surgeon to come back here." While she did, I took a second to marvel at what he'd said. "Yes. I want to know why they didn't splint my hand, because truthfully, I would rather not have this operation, I think it would be better for me to go back to Mexico and find a bone-healer to cure me."
It has become a fundamental principle of Western medicine that we don't do anything to the patient against their will. When we fill out consent forms, we often say, "but even if you sign this, you can change your mind at any time." Well, this man had.
Another surgeon on his team came to the bedside, and explained that they were planning to put his bones back where they need to be so they can heal. The man said something I've heard many times: "Bueno, si van a hacer lo que el dice, eso esta bien. Pero el otro doctor dijo que me iban a poner una placa y unos tornillos, y que si no queda bien, me van a tener que rajar la mano otra vez, y si hacen eso y queda mal, un cura-huesos ya no me va a poder ayudar, como es normal." I repeated, in English, "Well, if you're going to do what you're saying, that's fine. But the other doctor said you were going to put in a plate and some screws, and that if it doesn't turn out right, you'd have to cut open my hand again, and if you do that and it doesn't work, a bone-healer won't be able to help me the normal way."
"I'm sorry sir," the doctor said, "I didn't mean to confuse you. We will put the bones in their right place, but then we need to put in a plate and some screws to make sure they stay there. So what the other doctor told you is true, too. Would that be ok?" I communicated this to the patient. By this time, the whole surgery team had arrived. The patient gave an uncertain, hesitant "Yeah..."
The doctors conferred "Has he had any medication yet?" one of them asked. The other shook his head. "What about his injuries?" "Well, he didn't hit his head, and there's no sign of a TBI" I knew that stood for traumatic brain injury. In a second I realized they were trying to decide if he was fully in possession of his wits or if they could operate anyway, for his own good, since they had written consent. As it turned out, there was no loophole.
So the head surgeon, who had filled out the consent earlier, clapped him on the shoulder, in a gentle, friendly way and asked, "What are you worried about?"
At that, the man really let loose. He began talking about his employer, and his worries about being out of work but having huge bills to pay, and worry about having to have a second operation and have even more to pay; how he would rather take care of this at home, but there was no money at home; how he'd never hurt his hand this way before, and really, he didn't get it- it didn't look that bad. At this point, he began to take off the brace he'd been wearing and inspected his arm dubiously. He'd seen guys on the farm back home twist their wrists in some terrible ways, and the bone-healer had straightened them out in 5 minutes.
I did my best to keep pace with him, and finally the doctor said, "I think you have some serious concerns about this surgery. My opinion is that operating is what's best for you, but at the end of the day it's your body, and I won't do anything you don't want to have done. So why don't we wait another day or two and we can talk more, and you can think it over. We can wait two days, and if you want the surgery then, I will do it." The patient seemed on the fence still, but after everything he'd said, the team knew they couldn't operate.
They wheeled him away, and I got called away to another patient. But I was amazed and oddly elated. The patient I'd just worked with chose not to have an operation that would assuredly improve his quality of life, and yet, I had a spring in my step. It took me a minute to realize what it was... I had just witnessed true informed consent.
So often the patients I work with have reservations or questions about what the medical team decides to do. So often they don't say them out loud, or are not fully listened to. But today, there was real communication. This man's voice and his worries were really and truly heard, and it filled me with a fierce joy. I really hope that he gets to sit down with someone and really talk about his reservations. I hope he does get the operation, and that his body returns to full functioning as soon as possible. But for that day, in that moment, it amazed me to see the whole machinery and process of the medical system come to a full stop to respect this young man's wishes. This young man, a laborer from the rancho (the backwoods of Mexico), who stood no chance of getting workman's comp from his employer, even though he was hurt on the job; this man who had more faith in the cura-huesos than in a first world medical procedure, the type of person who is so rarely listened to that many they have learned not to raise their voices or their questions - this man was listened to. It felt, just a little bit, like justice.
At the bedside, along with about 3 nurses, was a handsome, strong-looking young surgeon practically shouting at a similarly young, strong-looking brown man in a hospital bed. "USTED PUEDE COMER COSAS COMO CAMARONES, MARISCO?" I was impressed by his decent vocabulary and grammar, but he looked pretty intimidating. I wasn't sure yet if this was my patient, but decided I didn't care. There was a good chance it was, and either way, this man deserved better communication. So I approached the bed and, projecting my voice above the machines, side-conversations, and the loud surgeon said, "Need an interpreter?" One of the nurses turned around and said, "Oh, perfect timing!" - as if I'd arrived by accident. I wondered who had requested an interpreter, and, for the millionth time, why most everyone else seemed to think they could do without one. The surgeon said, with relief on his face, "Oh, great, yeah, here's someone who's trained, let the professional do it." He sped off and I took his place at the head of the bed. Clearly someone had strongarmed him into helping them "get by." Still, I was grateful for his endorsement.
The nurses took him through their usual pre-operative questions: are you allergic to anything? when was the last time you ate or drank anything? etc. The surgeon came by with the signed consent to say that there were "a few things I had to add, and I need you to initial them - unfortunately they make me do that". He was apologetic, I think because the man found it so difficult to use his hands. Obviously, whoever had gone through the consent initially had done a rush job.
In case you're not familiar with consents for surgery, a consent contains several key elements: benefits of, risks of, and alternatives to the procedure are the most basic ones. The forms I've interpreted also often contain a diagnosis, who's performing the procedure, consent to receive blood if necessary, and disclaimers about video/camera recording and student presence in the operating room, among other things. Whoever had filled this consent out with the patient initially had forgotten to write in three things: the benefits of surgery, the name of the surgeon, and under risks, the possible need for further surgery. So we briefly went through the consent again. The doctor explained that the benefits would be to reduce pain and prevent the joint from stiffening, that it would require putting in a plate and some screws to keep the bones in place, and they would stay in for life, and that the patient might need further surgery at some point, but they couldn't predict that. This last is a blanket disclaimer that often gets thrown in as a way of saying, "something might go wrong at some future point, and you might need surgery again for it" It really doesn't mean anything more than "the future is unpredictable".
Our man initialed, painstakingly, in the places he was shown, and we continued to prep for surgery. The nurse stuck a Q-tip with a nasty looking brown substance up his nostrils to disinfect them, and had him brush his teeth with a mysterious liquid from a brown bottle. Finally she bent over him and asked, "Sir, do you have any questions for us?" Maybe it was something about her kind touch, or maybe he'd just had time while he was being disinfected to think about what he'd heard. In any case, he spoke up. "Si. Yo quiero saber porque no me entablillaron la mano, porque la verdad que prefiero que no me hagan esta operacion, pienso que seria mejor regresar a Mejico y encontrar un cura-huesos que me sane." He said more, but that was as far as I got in English before the nurse looked at me sternly and said, "So we need to get the surgeon to come back here." While she did, I took a second to marvel at what he'd said. "Yes. I want to know why they didn't splint my hand, because truthfully, I would rather not have this operation, I think it would be better for me to go back to Mexico and find a bone-healer to cure me."
It has become a fundamental principle of Western medicine that we don't do anything to the patient against their will. When we fill out consent forms, we often say, "but even if you sign this, you can change your mind at any time." Well, this man had.
Another surgeon on his team came to the bedside, and explained that they were planning to put his bones back where they need to be so they can heal. The man said something I've heard many times: "Bueno, si van a hacer lo que el dice, eso esta bien. Pero el otro doctor dijo que me iban a poner una placa y unos tornillos, y que si no queda bien, me van a tener que rajar la mano otra vez, y si hacen eso y queda mal, un cura-huesos ya no me va a poder ayudar, como es normal." I repeated, in English, "Well, if you're going to do what you're saying, that's fine. But the other doctor said you were going to put in a plate and some screws, and that if it doesn't turn out right, you'd have to cut open my hand again, and if you do that and it doesn't work, a bone-healer won't be able to help me the normal way."
"I'm sorry sir," the doctor said, "I didn't mean to confuse you. We will put the bones in their right place, but then we need to put in a plate and some screws to make sure they stay there. So what the other doctor told you is true, too. Would that be ok?" I communicated this to the patient. By this time, the whole surgery team had arrived. The patient gave an uncertain, hesitant "Yeah..."
The doctors conferred "Has he had any medication yet?" one of them asked. The other shook his head. "What about his injuries?" "Well, he didn't hit his head, and there's no sign of a TBI" I knew that stood for traumatic brain injury. In a second I realized they were trying to decide if he was fully in possession of his wits or if they could operate anyway, for his own good, since they had written consent. As it turned out, there was no loophole.
So the head surgeon, who had filled out the consent earlier, clapped him on the shoulder, in a gentle, friendly way and asked, "What are you worried about?"
At that, the man really let loose. He began talking about his employer, and his worries about being out of work but having huge bills to pay, and worry about having to have a second operation and have even more to pay; how he would rather take care of this at home, but there was no money at home; how he'd never hurt his hand this way before, and really, he didn't get it- it didn't look that bad. At this point, he began to take off the brace he'd been wearing and inspected his arm dubiously. He'd seen guys on the farm back home twist their wrists in some terrible ways, and the bone-healer had straightened them out in 5 minutes.
I did my best to keep pace with him, and finally the doctor said, "I think you have some serious concerns about this surgery. My opinion is that operating is what's best for you, but at the end of the day it's your body, and I won't do anything you don't want to have done. So why don't we wait another day or two and we can talk more, and you can think it over. We can wait two days, and if you want the surgery then, I will do it." The patient seemed on the fence still, but after everything he'd said, the team knew they couldn't operate.
They wheeled him away, and I got called away to another patient. But I was amazed and oddly elated. The patient I'd just worked with chose not to have an operation that would assuredly improve his quality of life, and yet, I had a spring in my step. It took me a minute to realize what it was... I had just witnessed true informed consent.
So often the patients I work with have reservations or questions about what the medical team decides to do. So often they don't say them out loud, or are not fully listened to. But today, there was real communication. This man's voice and his worries were really and truly heard, and it filled me with a fierce joy. I really hope that he gets to sit down with someone and really talk about his reservations. I hope he does get the operation, and that his body returns to full functioning as soon as possible. But for that day, in that moment, it amazed me to see the whole machinery and process of the medical system come to a full stop to respect this young man's wishes. This young man, a laborer from the rancho (the backwoods of Mexico), who stood no chance of getting workman's comp from his employer, even though he was hurt on the job; this man who had more faith in the cura-huesos than in a first world medical procedure, the type of person who is so rarely listened to that many they have learned not to raise their voices or their questions - this man was listened to. It felt, just a little bit, like justice.
Tuesday, July 11, 2017
do mi sol
Today I spent time interpreting for a patient of ours who is what we call a "frequent flyer," meaning her condition requires her to be in and out of the hospital quite a bit. She's gearing up for a new treatment, and so there was a good bit of talking to do today. There have been some rough patches with this family: for a while there was some conflict between mother and daughter, complicated by the fact that the daughter has a learning disability, so we spent lots of time interpreting for social workers or psychologists who were trying to mediate, and I personally always walked into those sessions with a good bit of trepidation. It was difficult, too, because the daughter is fully bilingual, and takes pride in being able to speak English with the staff. That puts us as interpreters in the somewhat awkward position of interpreting the daughter's words to her mother - while she's judging us to see if we said what she would want to say. In the midst of a fight, that can be tough. Thankfully that rough patch is over, and today was a simple matter of education: relatively pleasant and straightforward.
Afterward, I went to visit the chapel, as I often do, just to think or play the piano, or pray or sing. I had sat down to the piano and was playing a song when I heard the telltale sounds of someone entering the quiet, green-carpeted space. The door handle clicked, swung open. I didn't turn to look until I'd finished the verse in the song. When I did, I was expecting to see someone random, briefly apologize for disturbing them, and leave. Instead, I saw the same family I'd just interpreted for.
"Toca el piano?" the mother asked me, "Do you play the piano?" "Yes, one or two songs, not much" I said in Spanish, for once not parroting her words in English. This seemed to give her confidence. "Are you a Christian?" she asked, to which I replied that I was. "What church do you go to?" So I told her, and then her daughter piped up:"I want to know how to play the piano," she said. "Oh, yeah? Well, it's here if you ever want to practice," I said, not thinking about her upcoming treatment and how she wouldn't be able to, not sure what to say "it's always here." "Yes. I want to play the piano."
I looked at her and thought. This was the moment of truth. Or the moment where the sh*t hit the fan, depending on how you wanna look at it. It's one thing to exchange a few words, to be polite and not rude. It's something else entirely to actually interact. And then, I just went for it. "Ven," I said, "come on. I'll teach you one thing." I walked over to the piano, she followed, and I sat down on the bench next to her. I showed her how there is a pattern of three black keys, then two, then three, and how your hand goes at the beginning of the sequence of two. She learned to play from C up to E, on both hands, and since she was kinda going for it anyway, I showed her the arpeggio of C too. She was able to play those things, and before I left and went back to work I got to tell her in Spanish, "mira, ya sabes algo en el piano!" "Look, now you know something on the piano!"
Sitting there with her made my heart so happy! I've taught basic piano stuff to several of my cousins, and it was such a delight to do something so normal with her, without the awkwardness of talking over her, or for her mother, or about medical stuff. A relief from all the stressors I'm typically dealing with when I see her. The simple joys of teaching and music and encouragement. As I walked away I couldn't keep the giant smile from my face. It was good just to connect.
Afterward, I went to visit the chapel, as I often do, just to think or play the piano, or pray or sing. I had sat down to the piano and was playing a song when I heard the telltale sounds of someone entering the quiet, green-carpeted space. The door handle clicked, swung open. I didn't turn to look until I'd finished the verse in the song. When I did, I was expecting to see someone random, briefly apologize for disturbing them, and leave. Instead, I saw the same family I'd just interpreted for.
"Toca el piano?" the mother asked me, "Do you play the piano?" "Yes, one or two songs, not much" I said in Spanish, for once not parroting her words in English. This seemed to give her confidence. "Are you a Christian?" she asked, to which I replied that I was. "What church do you go to?" So I told her, and then her daughter piped up:"I want to know how to play the piano," she said. "Oh, yeah? Well, it's here if you ever want to practice," I said, not thinking about her upcoming treatment and how she wouldn't be able to, not sure what to say "it's always here." "Yes. I want to play the piano."
I looked at her and thought. This was the moment of truth. Or the moment where the sh*t hit the fan, depending on how you wanna look at it. It's one thing to exchange a few words, to be polite and not rude. It's something else entirely to actually interact. And then, I just went for it. "Ven," I said, "come on. I'll teach you one thing." I walked over to the piano, she followed, and I sat down on the bench next to her. I showed her how there is a pattern of three black keys, then two, then three, and how your hand goes at the beginning of the sequence of two. She learned to play from C up to E, on both hands, and since she was kinda going for it anyway, I showed her the arpeggio of C too. She was able to play those things, and before I left and went back to work I got to tell her in Spanish, "mira, ya sabes algo en el piano!" "Look, now you know something on the piano!"
Sitting there with her made my heart so happy! I've taught basic piano stuff to several of my cousins, and it was such a delight to do something so normal with her, without the awkwardness of talking over her, or for her mother, or about medical stuff. A relief from all the stressors I'm typically dealing with when I see her. The simple joys of teaching and music and encouragement. As I walked away I couldn't keep the giant smile from my face. It was good just to connect.
Sunday, July 9, 2017
Le Felicito
You'd think that, if you get a call to go interpret in the trauma center in the emergency room, you'd be walking into a crazy, dire situation every time. Turns out that's not necessarily the case. Because of this, I've come to understand the word "trauma" not as "intense dramatic event" but more like "physical ailment that's not a disease process;" in other words, some kind of impact or accident that caused the person harm... like falling from something, or having something fall on you, getting mugged, or shot, or cut, or stabbed, or hit by a car, or sometimes even just having fallen down. One time I interpreted for a guy, a cook, who had shaved off some of his finger with a knife; but another time there was a mother/daughter pair who'd been in a bad car accident and held hands across their stretchers - which I say to point to the fact that, although it's all trauma, how chaotic and scary a case is can vary dramatically. The guy who chopped his finger had rigged his own tourniquet with a rubber band, and the surgeon was super impressed, so half the time I was interpreting compliments. You just never know what you're going to get.
Most recently my favorite encounter in the trauma center was with an older man (a patient) and the younger doctor who was admitting him to the hospital after a bad fall.
I had been bouncing back and forth between interpreting for this same patient and a couple others all afternoon, and they eventually made the decision to admit him. Over the course of several hours, with different technicians and providers, I had discovered him to be decorous, good-humored, and patient. He knew his own health problems well, and was a deliberate, clear storyteller; full of fancy words, jokes and good manners. So when the admitting doctor arrived, I was pleased to realize that he was a clear communicator as well.
He made eye contact with the man on the stretcher. Shook his hand. Asked what had happened to bring him to the hospital. He maintained eye contact and took notes as I first listened to the story (my third time), and then told it to him in English. He paused before asking his next question, then looked the man in the eye and spoke clearly, despite the fact that he was speaking English and couldn't be sure how much the patient would understand. He was even able to use gesture to great effect, something a surprising amount of people don't do well intuitively. As he went through his series of questions, I became gradually less and less of an obvious presence in their communication. It was one of those golden moments, the ones you always angle for, where you've actually faded to the background and the people you're serving have formed their own connection. It was beautiful to see. And the MD continued to ask clear, thorough questions and get clear, well-worded answers.
At the end of the interaction, they shook hands, the MD turned to thank me, and we both began to walk away. Then suddenly, the man on the stretcher said, "Le felicito!" I wasn't sure what he meant, so I looked at him, brow furrowed, and repeated it in English with a questioning tone "Con...gratulations?" He took the hint. "Le felicito, doctor, excelente trabajo. Muy cientifico!" Aha, I thought, that's what he means. "I congratulate you, doctor, excellent work. Very scientific!" At which the MD smiled and said "Thank you very much!" - which the patient understood. He then turned and thanked me, and we said our goodbyes.
The German-English dictionary I use tells me that the German word "sich verabschieden" is "to bid farewell" or "take your leave" or "say goodbye". The Spanish "despedirse" comes to about the same thing, but I wish there were a noun in English for the closing at the end of an interaction. Like "greeting" but for goodbyes. I've noticed that these types of formalities are much more important in hispanic/latinx culture than in US culture (although the US varies a lot, and so do hispanic/latinx cultures). An example, though, would be how when you enter a room, you have to greet every person in it. At a party or gathering, saludar can be quite an ordeal, especially if you're an introvert! But it's equally important when you leave, to take leave of every person. Not to do so can be insulting. But I digress.
The thing that was interesting and beautiful about this despedida interaction between patient and provider was that what the patient really meant with his "Le felicito, muy cientifico!" was "You were very thorough, I feel heard by you, I trust you, and think you'll do a good job of taking care of me." It was proof, to me, that it had really happened for these two: a therapeutic relationship, that bond of trust and mutual respect, had been established - in just minutes! It was a privilege to take part in that.
Most recently my favorite encounter in the trauma center was with an older man (a patient) and the younger doctor who was admitting him to the hospital after a bad fall.
I had been bouncing back and forth between interpreting for this same patient and a couple others all afternoon, and they eventually made the decision to admit him. Over the course of several hours, with different technicians and providers, I had discovered him to be decorous, good-humored, and patient. He knew his own health problems well, and was a deliberate, clear storyteller; full of fancy words, jokes and good manners. So when the admitting doctor arrived, I was pleased to realize that he was a clear communicator as well.
He made eye contact with the man on the stretcher. Shook his hand. Asked what had happened to bring him to the hospital. He maintained eye contact and took notes as I first listened to the story (my third time), and then told it to him in English. He paused before asking his next question, then looked the man in the eye and spoke clearly, despite the fact that he was speaking English and couldn't be sure how much the patient would understand. He was even able to use gesture to great effect, something a surprising amount of people don't do well intuitively. As he went through his series of questions, I became gradually less and less of an obvious presence in their communication. It was one of those golden moments, the ones you always angle for, where you've actually faded to the background and the people you're serving have formed their own connection. It was beautiful to see. And the MD continued to ask clear, thorough questions and get clear, well-worded answers.
At the end of the interaction, they shook hands, the MD turned to thank me, and we both began to walk away. Then suddenly, the man on the stretcher said, "Le felicito!" I wasn't sure what he meant, so I looked at him, brow furrowed, and repeated it in English with a questioning tone "Con...gratulations?" He took the hint. "Le felicito, doctor, excelente trabajo. Muy cientifico!" Aha, I thought, that's what he means. "I congratulate you, doctor, excellent work. Very scientific!" At which the MD smiled and said "Thank you very much!" - which the patient understood. He then turned and thanked me, and we said our goodbyes.
The German-English dictionary I use tells me that the German word "sich verabschieden" is "to bid farewell" or "take your leave" or "say goodbye". The Spanish "despedirse" comes to about the same thing, but I wish there were a noun in English for the closing at the end of an interaction. Like "greeting" but for goodbyes. I've noticed that these types of formalities are much more important in hispanic/latinx culture than in US culture (although the US varies a lot, and so do hispanic/latinx cultures). An example, though, would be how when you enter a room, you have to greet every person in it. At a party or gathering, saludar can be quite an ordeal, especially if you're an introvert! But it's equally important when you leave, to take leave of every person. Not to do so can be insulting. But I digress.
The thing that was interesting and beautiful about this despedida interaction between patient and provider was that what the patient really meant with his "Le felicito, muy cientifico!" was "You were very thorough, I feel heard by you, I trust you, and think you'll do a good job of taking care of me." It was proof, to me, that it had really happened for these two: a therapeutic relationship, that bond of trust and mutual respect, had been established - in just minutes! It was a privilege to take part in that.
Friday, June 30, 2017
place of healing or collection of sick?
It has occurred to me recently that a lot of people say they "hate hospitals." I guess people who feel that way see hospitals mainly as a collection of sick people and a reminder that they, too, are mortal. But I firmly believe that hospitals are places of healing and recovery, full of people who are caring and wise. And maybe it's because I work in them day in and day out that I have such a positive view, but I don't think so. Hospitals are devoted to healing. That is their purpose. And healing requires love and collaboration and wisdom. Despite all the sad things that happen here, hospitals don't depress me: they give me hope. Let's bind up the brokenhearted and proclaim freedom for the captives.
Thursday, June 8, 2017
what filter are you using?
We were in a tiny room in the emergency department. Or maybe it just felt tiny from being so jam-packed. The stuff alone would have made it seem smaller than it actually was: two computers, a giant bed, some cabinets, an armchair, a sink, a regular chair, not to mention plenty of gadgets poking out from the walls. So having 5 adults and an almost-toddler crammed into corners around the furniture didn't help.
No-one sat on the bed, since the patient was in his mother's arms. I stood on one side of it, backed up to a computer, my presence backing Dad into a corner. Dr. K sat in the armchair, next to Mom, his legs crossed, his gestures confident, reassuring. Her face was like the sun on a windy, cloudy day: now a bright smile for her baby, now drawn and serious with worry. Two other doctors stood at the foot of the bed, on her other side, awkwardly, with their backs to the door, and we talked.
I was in conduit mode: that normal ping-pong from one language to another that we medical interpreters always do. At first I thought I'd only be batting the ball from Spanish to English for Dad, no need to go back from English to Spanish, since seemed to understand what he was being told. But at a questioning look from Mom, I realized it would be a full back-and-forth, so I went for it, all the while trying to play that eye-contact game that doesn't leave the family to stare into space when they hear someone they can understand, but still indicates that the speaker isn't where the words are coming from. Add that to the mental gymnastics.
The room probably wouldn't have felt quite as cramped if emotions on the family's side hadn't been quite so amped. Dad stood, defensive, speaking for both of them, asking if there was no other way. Mom let him speak, her worried face eloquent enough, until they started pleading, toward the end of the encounter, to try medicine for just a little while longer, instead of what the medical team was suggesting.
If you've ever worked with a speech therapist, you might know that swallowing isn't as easy as it seems. If you've never heard of a speech therapist, don't worry, I don't blame you. I hadn't either until I started hospital work. Apparently, in order to swallow, humans have to coordinate a bunch of different muscles, and this is something that can be hard to do after, say, an illness that affects the nerves, or a stroke. It can also be hard to learn in the first place - babies, especially those who have other problems, often have trouble learning how to swallow.
This isn't just problematic from a nutritional standpoint (although there is that aspect to it, too), it's also a problem because it turns out that letting food or liquid get into your lungs (which is called aspiration) can cause pneumonia. So you can end up hungry, dehydrated AND pretty seriously ill.
Of course, the medical world being what it is, they've come up with ways to help people who can't swallow correctly: basically different ways of bypassing the mouth and putting food directly into the stomach or intestines. One option is to thread a small flexible plastic tube up your nostril, down your throat and esophagus, and into your stomach (or further down into your small intestine). That was what the medical staff wanted to do for this baby so he could rest from the stress of not being able to figure out how to coordinate his insides, and try again later.
The staff was doing their absolute best to explain to the family that this wouldn't bother the child once it was in, wouldn't hurt him, and would prevent him from getting seriously ill with aspiration pneumonia. That he would, in time, learn to swallow and be able to live a normal life. To them, it really wasn't a big deal. An easy fix, minimally invasive, cost-effective, cheap... and they were doing their best to reassure the parents that it really was nothing to worry about. But the family wasn't having it.
Whenever I tell people that I'm an interpreter, their first reaction is usually "Wow, so you have to know all that medical vocabulary!" And the truth is, as much as the profession's current 40-h training course does teach some vocabulary and concepts, working in the hospital puts you through a necessary, intensely steep learning curve. (Just as an example, everything I explained above about speech therapy, swallowing difficulties, and NG tubes, I learned while working.) Interpreters are not trained as clinicians, but we do work with them every day, and so learn from them. In this way, interpreters become cross-cultural. Our work requires us to perpetually bridge the medical world and the layperson world, and the result is that we no longer truly belonging to either. We are part of the hospital system, work closely with clinicians, and understand much of what goes on from long observation and a healthy dose of inquisitiveness; but our training is in communication rather than medicine, and what medical knowledge we have is gathered, like wild berries on a walk, from random encounters. I've often said it feels like having a backstage pass to the world of medicine. If I had to hazard a guess, I would say that the frustration that results from this tension is one important reason why many of my colleagues choose to go on to become nurses or PAs.
So as usual, in this situation I was straddling the divide. But this time I was inclined to see things more from the medical providers' perspective. I work with lots of very sick children, and often an NG tube (naso-gastric, for "nose to stomach") or some variation of one is just one of many things they have in for weeks at a time. Standard equipment, you might say. And this baby wasn't even ill. The tube WAS the solution, so to my mind, the idea that this and some therapy was all the baby would need was good news.
For this family, though, it was a BIG DEAL. Their dearest wish was to take their child home and keep trying to help him eat. Maybe with some medicine. As I listened to them, I thought about how Hispanic/Latino culture puts a lot of emphasis on eating. For example, "Eating well," or "comer bien" has become a set phrase with connotations of health, correctness, and plenty, and "comer de todo" or, liking/eating all foods is considered a virtue. And I've noticed, working with families where it's come into question, that eating must involve food, chewing, and swallowing. So the idea that their baby might not be able to eat was very distressing for these parents.
In the end, I don't know what agreement the family and the medical staff came to. But it was a good reminder to me to keep both feet firmly in both worlds, to resist the temptation to align myself with the clinicians. I often identify most strongly with the patients, who are transplants not only to American culture, but to medical culture as well. I remember what that feels like, and want to make the interactions as seamless for them as possible: to make it easier. But this time, I found myself almost amused at the intensity of the family's worries. Didn't they know how simple this would be? ...at which point, I had to check myself.
It made me think about just how much I have acculturated to this wacky medical world of inventions and interventions, apparatus and operations. Just because I saw NG tubes on a daily basis doesn't mean that in regular every day life, having one of those tubes in your child's nose and taking him or her to therapies would be easy to deal with, or in any way normal. It would likely end up being one of the family stories, just like the time uncle Bob set a bush on fire when he was 6 and tried to put it out with Dixie cups of water, or that other time aunt Julia jumped off the bed and cracked her head open on the rocking chair, and Grandpa had to sew her up in the bathroom.
And that's kind of how it is, being cross cultural... your perspective fluctuates in and out. If life really looked like instagram, it'd be like having 5 or 8 color filters on all the time, all blending into each other randomly (or as you chose to focus on them). Sometimes one fades slightly as another comes to the fore, changing the scene, and something's always shifting. One minute you're in the patient's shoes, the next you're adding in the nurse's point of view, then layering it with your own as a part of interpreter culture, but by that time the patient's viewpoint has faded a little, so you revisit it... you never quite fully embody any one of them. No one color every fully saturates your lens.
No-one sat on the bed, since the patient was in his mother's arms. I stood on one side of it, backed up to a computer, my presence backing Dad into a corner. Dr. K sat in the armchair, next to Mom, his legs crossed, his gestures confident, reassuring. Her face was like the sun on a windy, cloudy day: now a bright smile for her baby, now drawn and serious with worry. Two other doctors stood at the foot of the bed, on her other side, awkwardly, with their backs to the door, and we talked.
I was in conduit mode: that normal ping-pong from one language to another that we medical interpreters always do. At first I thought I'd only be batting the ball from Spanish to English for Dad, no need to go back from English to Spanish, since seemed to understand what he was being told. But at a questioning look from Mom, I realized it would be a full back-and-forth, so I went for it, all the while trying to play that eye-contact game that doesn't leave the family to stare into space when they hear someone they can understand, but still indicates that the speaker isn't where the words are coming from. Add that to the mental gymnastics.
The room probably wouldn't have felt quite as cramped if emotions on the family's side hadn't been quite so amped. Dad stood, defensive, speaking for both of them, asking if there was no other way. Mom let him speak, her worried face eloquent enough, until they started pleading, toward the end of the encounter, to try medicine for just a little while longer, instead of what the medical team was suggesting.
* * *
If you've ever worked with a speech therapist, you might know that swallowing isn't as easy as it seems. If you've never heard of a speech therapist, don't worry, I don't blame you. I hadn't either until I started hospital work. Apparently, in order to swallow, humans have to coordinate a bunch of different muscles, and this is something that can be hard to do after, say, an illness that affects the nerves, or a stroke. It can also be hard to learn in the first place - babies, especially those who have other problems, often have trouble learning how to swallow.
This isn't just problematic from a nutritional standpoint (although there is that aspect to it, too), it's also a problem because it turns out that letting food or liquid get into your lungs (which is called aspiration) can cause pneumonia. So you can end up hungry, dehydrated AND pretty seriously ill.
Of course, the medical world being what it is, they've come up with ways to help people who can't swallow correctly: basically different ways of bypassing the mouth and putting food directly into the stomach or intestines. One option is to thread a small flexible plastic tube up your nostril, down your throat and esophagus, and into your stomach (or further down into your small intestine). That was what the medical staff wanted to do for this baby so he could rest from the stress of not being able to figure out how to coordinate his insides, and try again later.
* * *
The staff was doing their absolute best to explain to the family that this wouldn't bother the child once it was in, wouldn't hurt him, and would prevent him from getting seriously ill with aspiration pneumonia. That he would, in time, learn to swallow and be able to live a normal life. To them, it really wasn't a big deal. An easy fix, minimally invasive, cost-effective, cheap... and they were doing their best to reassure the parents that it really was nothing to worry about. But the family wasn't having it.
Whenever I tell people that I'm an interpreter, their first reaction is usually "Wow, so you have to know all that medical vocabulary!" And the truth is, as much as the profession's current 40-h training course does teach some vocabulary and concepts, working in the hospital puts you through a necessary, intensely steep learning curve. (Just as an example, everything I explained above about speech therapy, swallowing difficulties, and NG tubes, I learned while working.) Interpreters are not trained as clinicians, but we do work with them every day, and so learn from them. In this way, interpreters become cross-cultural. Our work requires us to perpetually bridge the medical world and the layperson world, and the result is that we no longer truly belonging to either. We are part of the hospital system, work closely with clinicians, and understand much of what goes on from long observation and a healthy dose of inquisitiveness; but our training is in communication rather than medicine, and what medical knowledge we have is gathered, like wild berries on a walk, from random encounters. I've often said it feels like having a backstage pass to the world of medicine. If I had to hazard a guess, I would say that the frustration that results from this tension is one important reason why many of my colleagues choose to go on to become nurses or PAs.
So as usual, in this situation I was straddling the divide. But this time I was inclined to see things more from the medical providers' perspective. I work with lots of very sick children, and often an NG tube (naso-gastric, for "nose to stomach") or some variation of one is just one of many things they have in for weeks at a time. Standard equipment, you might say. And this baby wasn't even ill. The tube WAS the solution, so to my mind, the idea that this and some therapy was all the baby would need was good news.
For this family, though, it was a BIG DEAL. Their dearest wish was to take their child home and keep trying to help him eat. Maybe with some medicine. As I listened to them, I thought about how Hispanic/Latino culture puts a lot of emphasis on eating. For example, "Eating well," or "comer bien" has become a set phrase with connotations of health, correctness, and plenty, and "comer de todo" or, liking/eating all foods is considered a virtue. And I've noticed, working with families where it's come into question, that eating must involve food, chewing, and swallowing. So the idea that their baby might not be able to eat was very distressing for these parents.
In the end, I don't know what agreement the family and the medical staff came to. But it was a good reminder to me to keep both feet firmly in both worlds, to resist the temptation to align myself with the clinicians. I often identify most strongly with the patients, who are transplants not only to American culture, but to medical culture as well. I remember what that feels like, and want to make the interactions as seamless for them as possible: to make it easier. But this time, I found myself almost amused at the intensity of the family's worries. Didn't they know how simple this would be? ...at which point, I had to check myself.
It made me think about just how much I have acculturated to this wacky medical world of inventions and interventions, apparatus and operations. Just because I saw NG tubes on a daily basis doesn't mean that in regular every day life, having one of those tubes in your child's nose and taking him or her to therapies would be easy to deal with, or in any way normal. It would likely end up being one of the family stories, just like the time uncle Bob set a bush on fire when he was 6 and tried to put it out with Dixie cups of water, or that other time aunt Julia jumped off the bed and cracked her head open on the rocking chair, and Grandpa had to sew her up in the bathroom.
And that's kind of how it is, being cross cultural... your perspective fluctuates in and out. If life really looked like instagram, it'd be like having 5 or 8 color filters on all the time, all blending into each other randomly (or as you chose to focus on them). Sometimes one fades slightly as another comes to the fore, changing the scene, and something's always shifting. One minute you're in the patient's shoes, the next you're adding in the nurse's point of view, then layering it with your own as a part of interpreter culture, but by that time the patient's viewpoint has faded a little, so you revisit it... you never quite fully embody any one of them. No one color every fully saturates your lens.
Thursday, June 1, 2017
aqui estoy
As we sat in her basement office at the hospital, my aunt looked me straight in the eyes and said in her friendly but challenging way: "Yeah, I bet they didn't prepare you for THAT in interpreter training!" I had paid her a rare visit, the first person to ever mention medical interpreting to me as a profession, to pick up some things she'd brought me, and we ended up chatting about our respective professional lives. She's been an attending MD at a teaching hospital ever since I can remember, and it's been nice, in recent years, to have more access to and understanding of this part of her life.
And she was right. They definitely did NOT prepare me for the experience I'd told her about in interpreter training. Turns out, no one had prepared her for it back in medical school, either. She'd had to stagger from the sheer weight of it too, just like me. "They do it much better now," she said, and I wished my profession had grown as much.
You see, they don't tell you in that ever-so-crammed 40 hour course that sometimes medical professionals won't be able to stop a disease process. Sometimes your patients, despite the team's best efforts, or for reasons they can't explain, will die.
Today, one of my patients died. Right in front of me, effortlessly. Barely discernibly, she closed this chapter of her existence and let go. (I'm sorry to be so cliche. It's just that it was such a big deal that the two-word sentence that states the fact, "She died," is too bare and bald and can't carry the weight of what just happened. There should be poetry.)
Allow me to tell you the story. Or, if you'd rather not read it, you can skip to the end by looking for the * break.
****************************
It was genetic, so we knew it was coming. When I walked into the office this morning, the whiteboard where we put patient updates said "[this child] is dying." So I looked her up, to see what disease she had, and tried to understand. But since my expertise is in communication and culture, not medicine, it honestly went over my head. Then I got the call, and the dispatcher said, please go to this child's bedside. So I went.
Although I knew that she was sick I didn't know before I went just how bad it was. When I arrived the sounds of distress were already coming from the room. The respiratory therapist sitting outside said, "you can go ahead and go in," so I did. There was a contact precautions sign on the door, so I put on the disposable yellow gown, blue gloves, and teal face mask the hospital provides in order to protect its staff from getting the diseases they're treating for. It feels a little like wearing a costume, and though I'm always glad for the protection, I also can't help feeling a little ridiculous.
When I went in, the sobs had quieted. The child was in her mother's arms, her father standing, pacing, looking utterly lost in the crowded little 6x8 room. My attention closed on that core family focal point, and everything else took several minutes to come into focus for me: the nurse, the tech and MD, grandparents and uncle, chairs, tables, beds, and medical machines. A couple people wore masks, but I was the only one all suited up. Oops. The doc found a chair for Dad, and had him sit next to his wife and child.
"Her oxygen is very low," the doctor said, "and so is her heart rate. I think... I think we only have a little bit of time left with her." "Su oxigeno esta bien bajo, y su ritmo cardiaco tambien," I said, being sure to imitate her intentionally calm voice and the respectful, sorrowful hesitation "Creo... pienso que ya solo nos queda un poquito de tiempo con ella." Dad, who had bowed his head over his little girl with his wife, all three of them together, raised his head. "Minutos?" he asked. "Minutes?" I repeated. "Yes, I think so." "Creo que si." At which there was more sobbing.
We waited. I felt so silly in my yellow paper get-up. I felt almost disrespectful... but taking it off during this solemn encounter would have been far worse. So I waited. We waited. A few minutes passed, as the nurse turned off most of the monitors, leaving just one little one blinking away. Then the doctor motioned for her to hand her the stethoscope, and gestured to ask if she could listen to the child's heart. She listened, heard what she needed, and pronounced this child's death. More sobbing. I kept concentrating on holding back the tears from my voice in every small thing I had to pass back and forth. I kept watching with all my might, thinking how the medical staff was responding to the events of the moment, wondering how they were feeling and how they would handle it themselves later, wondering how they had prepared for this moment.
I watched the family, but not too closely, from respect and for fear of breaking down. They were calling their dead child by every pet name they could think of, a last declaration of love, like roses or desperate lifelines thrown after her retreating consciousness and falling short. I chose not to interpret those names. For one thing, it was clear as day what they were doing, and so needed no translation. For another, it would have been inapproapriate. Those words were so intimate and private; they weren't intended for the medical team, and to interpret them would made them sterile. (Can you imagine repeating the words of freshest parental grief? Could you do them justice?) And in addition to those factors, to repeat those words, to try to take on that role, would have hurt more than I was willing to bear in that moment. If I had felt it necessary, I would have done my best, but I was grateful that it seemed not to be.
We asked if they needed anything, and then gave them some time to themselves. I went on to interpret for the nurse, a couple staff who came by to give condolences, and for a child life specialist who came in to help the family make tangible memories of their baby girl. I watched Dad's pacing become more purposeful as he informed family members of the event, and discussed funeral arrangements. Gradually, they walked out of the intensity of immediate grief and into the practicalities of the moment, as we must. But they kept randomly sobbing, as it would strike them afresh that their baby daughter was no longer with them.
****************************
And she was right. They definitely did NOT prepare me for the experience I'd told her about in interpreter training. Turns out, no one had prepared her for it back in medical school, either. She'd had to stagger from the sheer weight of it too, just like me. "They do it much better now," she said, and I wished my profession had grown as much.
You see, they don't tell you in that ever-so-crammed 40 hour course that sometimes medical professionals won't be able to stop a disease process. Sometimes your patients, despite the team's best efforts, or for reasons they can't explain, will die.
Today, one of my patients died. Right in front of me, effortlessly. Barely discernibly, she closed this chapter of her existence and let go. (I'm sorry to be so cliche. It's just that it was such a big deal that the two-word sentence that states the fact, "She died," is too bare and bald and can't carry the weight of what just happened. There should be poetry.)
Allow me to tell you the story. Or, if you'd rather not read it, you can skip to the end by looking for the * break.
****************************
It was genetic, so we knew it was coming. When I walked into the office this morning, the whiteboard where we put patient updates said "[this child] is dying." So I looked her up, to see what disease she had, and tried to understand. But since my expertise is in communication and culture, not medicine, it honestly went over my head. Then I got the call, and the dispatcher said, please go to this child's bedside. So I went.
Although I knew that she was sick I didn't know before I went just how bad it was. When I arrived the sounds of distress were already coming from the room. The respiratory therapist sitting outside said, "you can go ahead and go in," so I did. There was a contact precautions sign on the door, so I put on the disposable yellow gown, blue gloves, and teal face mask the hospital provides in order to protect its staff from getting the diseases they're treating for. It feels a little like wearing a costume, and though I'm always glad for the protection, I also can't help feeling a little ridiculous.
When I went in, the sobs had quieted. The child was in her mother's arms, her father standing, pacing, looking utterly lost in the crowded little 6x8 room. My attention closed on that core family focal point, and everything else took several minutes to come into focus for me: the nurse, the tech and MD, grandparents and uncle, chairs, tables, beds, and medical machines. A couple people wore masks, but I was the only one all suited up. Oops. The doc found a chair for Dad, and had him sit next to his wife and child.
"Her oxygen is very low," the doctor said, "and so is her heart rate. I think... I think we only have a little bit of time left with her." "Su oxigeno esta bien bajo, y su ritmo cardiaco tambien," I said, being sure to imitate her intentionally calm voice and the respectful, sorrowful hesitation "Creo... pienso que ya solo nos queda un poquito de tiempo con ella." Dad, who had bowed his head over his little girl with his wife, all three of them together, raised his head. "Minutos?" he asked. "Minutes?" I repeated. "Yes, I think so." "Creo que si." At which there was more sobbing.
We waited. I felt so silly in my yellow paper get-up. I felt almost disrespectful... but taking it off during this solemn encounter would have been far worse. So I waited. We waited. A few minutes passed, as the nurse turned off most of the monitors, leaving just one little one blinking away. Then the doctor motioned for her to hand her the stethoscope, and gestured to ask if she could listen to the child's heart. She listened, heard what she needed, and pronounced this child's death. More sobbing. I kept concentrating on holding back the tears from my voice in every small thing I had to pass back and forth. I kept watching with all my might, thinking how the medical staff was responding to the events of the moment, wondering how they were feeling and how they would handle it themselves later, wondering how they had prepared for this moment.
I watched the family, but not too closely, from respect and for fear of breaking down. They were calling their dead child by every pet name they could think of, a last declaration of love, like roses or desperate lifelines thrown after her retreating consciousness and falling short. I chose not to interpret those names. For one thing, it was clear as day what they were doing, and so needed no translation. For another, it would have been inapproapriate. Those words were so intimate and private; they weren't intended for the medical team, and to interpret them would made them sterile. (Can you imagine repeating the words of freshest parental grief? Could you do them justice?) And in addition to those factors, to repeat those words, to try to take on that role, would have hurt more than I was willing to bear in that moment. If I had felt it necessary, I would have done my best, but I was grateful that it seemed not to be.
We asked if they needed anything, and then gave them some time to themselves. I went on to interpret for the nurse, a couple staff who came by to give condolences, and for a child life specialist who came in to help the family make tangible memories of their baby girl. I watched Dad's pacing become more purposeful as he informed family members of the event, and discussed funeral arrangements. Gradually, they walked out of the intensity of immediate grief and into the practicalities of the moment, as we must. But they kept randomly sobbing, as it would strike them afresh that their baby daughter was no longer with them.
****************************
Today, after this
child’s passing, the family wanted to make molds of her feet and
imprints of her hands, so a child life specialist was called to the
room to help them make these tangible memories. We had a moment to
wait outside the room, so we were talking and she said, “I know it
sounds weird, but although it’s hard, I like the work I do with
bereavements. When I leave, I know I have helped them and done
something for them.” I understood what she was saying. I don’t
make anything tangible for people, and don’t do anything
clinical/medical with the patients, but there is something else I do.
I empathize with them.
I have been an interpreter for two and a half years now, and as everyone in the profession will tell you, the hard or sad things are easier to remember than the good or beautiful ones. I've seen a lot of things now that come easily to mind.A woman dying of cancer, fully prepared to face her fate; a mother who fainted dead away because the pressure to emotionally support her son (who was in a coma) overwhelmed her; a newly delivered baby with her organs inside-out and her grieving, half-sedated mother and inarticulate father; a mother who refused to believe her son would suffer any negative side effects from the chemo he needed to prepare him for a bone marrow transplant; a mother who's son was dying declaring she'd give her life for him if she could... those are the hard ones. Not to mention the parents I've seen fight impossibly challenging circumstances to make sure their babies survived.
I have seen and known these people, and I have spoken their words. Those people, and many more, are part of me now; their voices have shaped who I am and will become. I'm so glad they have. And I'm honored to be with them in those moments.
In Spanish, when you say, "I am here," or "I'm going to stay with her," it means more than it means when we say it in English. It carries this extra layer of meaning that says, "I am going to make sure you're not alone. I am here to make sure you're not surrounded by strangers. I am here as someone who cares about you." It's this really beautiful thing about Spanish and Latino culture that you always to your best to make sure no one you care about has to face anything alone - whether it's driving to the bank to make a deposit or walking through cancer. I love the opportunity to make it so that people don't have to face healthcare alone, both by being with them myself, as a Spanish speaker, and by helping them form bonds with the rest of the healthcare team. I think probably a lot of interpreters do.
From what I understand about grief, what people need most in those seasons is for someone to be with them, on a soul level. We need people to say, "I've been there, I get it. It sucks." I don't empathize exactly like that, by expressing my own thoughts; in a lot of ways, I don't get to be an active participant in what happens. But somehow in speaking the words they speak, in transmitting them to the rest of the care team, I do form a bond of empathy with them. When I say their words, transmit their jokes, or their anger, or their confusion, I am in a sense acting them out. It's like being in a play where you get the script in real time (but in the wrong language. Ha.). I get to BE them in English or Spanish, and in so doing I get to be WITH them in a powerful way. To use Christianese, I come alongside them, walk with them. Nothing more, nothing less. I don’t add or take away anything, no meaning originates in me. But in those moments, in the real nitty-gritty bits of life, I am with them in a very profound way: as someone who understands them, and makes a bridge for others to do the same. So I like that. It is satisfying. It’s active love.
And that is what I enjoy the most about my job. I get to love people in that active way every day.
I have been an interpreter for two and a half years now, and as everyone in the profession will tell you, the hard or sad things are easier to remember than the good or beautiful ones. I've seen a lot of things now that come easily to mind.A woman dying of cancer, fully prepared to face her fate; a mother who fainted dead away because the pressure to emotionally support her son (who was in a coma) overwhelmed her; a newly delivered baby with her organs inside-out and her grieving, half-sedated mother and inarticulate father; a mother who refused to believe her son would suffer any negative side effects from the chemo he needed to prepare him for a bone marrow transplant; a mother who's son was dying declaring she'd give her life for him if she could... those are the hard ones. Not to mention the parents I've seen fight impossibly challenging circumstances to make sure their babies survived.
I have seen and known these people, and I have spoken their words. Those people, and many more, are part of me now; their voices have shaped who I am and will become. I'm so glad they have. And I'm honored to be with them in those moments.
In Spanish, when you say, "I am here," or "I'm going to stay with her," it means more than it means when we say it in English. It carries this extra layer of meaning that says, "I am going to make sure you're not alone. I am here to make sure you're not surrounded by strangers. I am here as someone who cares about you." It's this really beautiful thing about Spanish and Latino culture that you always to your best to make sure no one you care about has to face anything alone - whether it's driving to the bank to make a deposit or walking through cancer. I love the opportunity to make it so that people don't have to face healthcare alone, both by being with them myself, as a Spanish speaker, and by helping them form bonds with the rest of the healthcare team. I think probably a lot of interpreters do.
From what I understand about grief, what people need most in those seasons is for someone to be with them, on a soul level. We need people to say, "I've been there, I get it. It sucks." I don't empathize exactly like that, by expressing my own thoughts; in a lot of ways, I don't get to be an active participant in what happens. But somehow in speaking the words they speak, in transmitting them to the rest of the care team, I do form a bond of empathy with them. When I say their words, transmit their jokes, or their anger, or their confusion, I am in a sense acting them out. It's like being in a play where you get the script in real time (but in the wrong language. Ha.). I get to BE them in English or Spanish, and in so doing I get to be WITH them in a powerful way. To use Christianese, I come alongside them, walk with them. Nothing more, nothing less. I don’t add or take away anything, no meaning originates in me. But in those moments, in the real nitty-gritty bits of life, I am with them in a very profound way: as someone who understands them, and makes a bridge for others to do the same. So I like that. It is satisfying. It’s active love.
And that is what I enjoy the most about my job. I get to love people in that active way every day.
Thursday, March 2, 2017
the bonds we (interpreters) form
It's a sad case. I remembered halfway through the ethics meeting that the child had a metabolic disorder. That she came from Central America just for her, much like a coworker of mine. This mother is so beautiful. Seeing her cry nearly brought me to tears. Her face is weathered and wrinkled and brown, one side less expressive than the other. Her eyes have so many smile lines, they're like little triangles. She's determined and loving and hard-working. Tuechtig, would be the German word. And I love her. Somehow. I wish I knew her name, not just her daughter's. I wish I understood her disease better... or could form a bond with the family. I'm glad I'll get to be around to hear what happens with them.
Another beautiful mom. I was glad to hear (and 2 seconds later, relay) that her baby had her surgery and is doing well. I wonder what kind of person she is. Today she was VERY nicely dressed. Like another coworker of mine, or her friends. She always gives me the impression of being well-nurtured and happy. Rich in the best sense of the word.
Goliath's* mom too, he's one of our cancer patients. She was happy and less worried in clinic today, which was nice to see. And Goliath was less sullen/more talkative than I've ever seen him. Things must be getting better.
It's such a privilege to see mother-love like this, all day. To get to say what they say, and in saying it, empathize with them, as if I were an actor playing their role, but in English. I am struck by how beautiful they are as they care for their kids; how they love them with all practicality, dealing with the ins and outs of a foreign healthcare system - all its procedures and people and red tape - in a non-Spanish-speaking country, so that their kid can just be sick. So they can get better.
I never know what to say when they look me in the eyes and say thank you, "gracias" or "gracias a usted por interpreter," "thank you for interpreting." It's like suddenly, when I have to speak my own words instead of everyone else's, I'm tongue-tied, jammed with the traffic of all the things I want to say to them for myself, all the things I've been thinking and feeling as I feel and speak for others. I'm not the doctor anymore, or the social worker imparting knowledge and wisdom. Neither am I a mother looking to the interests of her child. I am me. And I... mumble and stumble, and forget to smile. I run away in an embarrassed hurry of unspoken thoughts.
Maybe I just haven't found the version of "you're welcome" that I like. Maybe I need to intentionally pause and say something meaningful. Something about how glad I am to do this work. Even though it costs me my self.
Maybe I'll smile, look right back, and say:
"It was a pleasure to work with you." - "Me dio mucho gusto trabajar con usted(es)."
Because no matter what I've had to say, it almost always is.
*Goliath must obviously be a fake name. Privacy and all that.
Another beautiful mom. I was glad to hear (and 2 seconds later, relay) that her baby had her surgery and is doing well. I wonder what kind of person she is. Today she was VERY nicely dressed. Like another coworker of mine, or her friends. She always gives me the impression of being well-nurtured and happy. Rich in the best sense of the word.
Goliath's* mom too, he's one of our cancer patients. She was happy and less worried in clinic today, which was nice to see. And Goliath was less sullen/more talkative than I've ever seen him. Things must be getting better.
It's such a privilege to see mother-love like this, all day. To get to say what they say, and in saying it, empathize with them, as if I were an actor playing their role, but in English. I am struck by how beautiful they are as they care for their kids; how they love them with all practicality, dealing with the ins and outs of a foreign healthcare system - all its procedures and people and red tape - in a non-Spanish-speaking country, so that their kid can just be sick. So they can get better.
I never know what to say when they look me in the eyes and say thank you, "gracias" or "gracias a usted por interpreter," "thank you for interpreting." It's like suddenly, when I have to speak my own words instead of everyone else's, I'm tongue-tied, jammed with the traffic of all the things I want to say to them for myself, all the things I've been thinking and feeling as I feel and speak for others. I'm not the doctor anymore, or the social worker imparting knowledge and wisdom. Neither am I a mother looking to the interests of her child. I am me. And I... mumble and stumble, and forget to smile. I run away in an embarrassed hurry of unspoken thoughts.
Maybe I just haven't found the version of "you're welcome" that I like. Maybe I need to intentionally pause and say something meaningful. Something about how glad I am to do this work. Even though it costs me my self.
Maybe I'll smile, look right back, and say:
"It was a pleasure to work with you." - "Me dio mucho gusto trabajar con usted(es)."
Because no matter what I've had to say, it almost always is.
*Goliath must obviously be a fake name. Privacy and all that.
Saturday, February 4, 2017
how does a pebble feel in an ocean?
It was a normal-ish Saturday. I was on my own, one interpreter for 16 floors of hospital, and I had someone in the ICU who was going to be disconnected, whose grieving family needed to sign paperwork and needed help understanding it. The MD was breathing down my back to get it done in a hurry and - what was worse - the hospice agency nurse was dismissive of the language barrier and blithely went right in to start without me. And then I got a call to go to an occupational therapy session on another floor. So like I said... normal-ish. The attitudes, at least, were normal, the characters behaving as expected. I figure, OT can probably use the phones, but since I had a minute, I decide to go check out the situation.
When I arrive, the therapist says they already tried the phones, but the interpreter was having some trouble understanding the patient. So, as so often happens when a patient tries to talk and no one understands them, instead of wondering what other barriers might exist to communication, someone decided to ask 'is he thinking clearly?' Of course, once the question is asked, they have to check, and that was what this OT had been asked to do. Fortunately, the therapist was gracious, and declared herself perfectly happy to see another patient on the same floor first while I went and finished up with my ICU patient. "Thanks dear, just come find me when you're done." So I went and took care of the paperwork, sat with the grieving, but capable family in the ICU, and headed on back to the other ward.
The patient was in one of two beds in a room partitioned by a thin pink plastic curtain. I looked to the clunky hospital bed, surrounded by awkward, dingily colored hospital furniture and found it empty. The OT, Louisa, knocked on the door. There was a faint reply, so we waited. Louisa turned to me, "I have no idea how to say his name," she said, and pointed it out to me on a piece of paper with cramped little boxes denoting patient's names, locations, medical record numbers, and some scribbled notes. The name read like something that wasn't quite Spanish, and I wondered aloud if perhaps this man was from Guatemala, with a name of indigenous origin. Just then, our patient came out of the bathroom. He was a short, solidly built man with a square face, wrinkled and weathered a warm brown, and the dignified way he carried himself made me like him immediately.
We introduced ourselves, she in English, I repeating both our names in Spanish, and he waved his hands "No spikee Eenglish" he said. I felt a pang of sadness as I realized how well practiced that particular phrase was, and that he hadn't heard us. I spoke louder. "Sí señor, para eso estoy yo. Voy a ser su interprete." "Yes sir, that's why I'm here. I'm going to be your interpreter." He got it, but said, "I'm sorry miss, I don't hear very well out of this ear." 'Aha,' I thought, 'THAT's why the phone interpreter had trouble understanding him.' So I readjusted my position in the room, and my speaking volume, and we got going.
We asked him what his plans were once he was discharged. Where did he live? As he answered, I began to notice that he spoke Spanish like it was his second language, like other people I've worked with who were speakers of indigenous languages from Guatemala, southern Mexico and Belize. Strike two against the phone interpreter. In answer to Louisa's question he told us he lived in a shelter, and named a homeless shelter in the city. "So what do you do during the day, when the shelter closes?" Louisa asked "In the summer when it's warm, I'm just on the street. When it's cold out, there are other shelters I go to." The story that began to emerge as we asked questions and listened to the man's answers was one I was familiar with. Several of my neighbors, the ones from when I lived one of the most impoverished, abandoned neighborhoods in my city, had told similar stories. They explained to me that shelters kicked you out early, by 5:30 or 6 in the morning; that you have to be in line at the shelter by early afternoon to secure your spot; that there are a lot of churches that hand out meals, and soup. But one of his answers to the questions we were asking added a whole new dimension to this homeless lifestyle.
"Sir, do you have any friends, or family in the area that you could stay with?" Louisa continued. Just about every homeless man I've known has had "people," meaning family, living somewhere. But before I could even finish getting the question out in Spanish, he started shaking his head. "No, estoy yo solo." "No, I'm all by myself." He continued: "Yo vivo con 250 negros," he made a wide, cirlcling gesture with his hands, as if he were surrounded, "yo soy el único hispano. Hay un cubano negro que habla un poquito de Español, pero no mucho." I interpreted: "I live with 250 black men, and I'm the only hispanic. There's one black cuban guy who speaks a little Spanish, but not much." In my mind, I could clearly see him, the only short, solidly built, hispanic man, among his black roommates, line-mates, and dinner companions, not a friend among them. I imagined him in the shelter, his warm, worn brown skin so light it might not even register as brown compared to those around him. I tried to comprehend how isolating it must be for him among his 250 roommates, streetmates, if his best English phrase was what he had given us before: "No spikee Eenglish" No wonder he shook his head so quickly, with such gravity.
She asked another question, and we had some trouble getting it across, so I intervened. My professional curiosity was getting to me, and I decided it was time to find out. I couldn't tell if the problem was the fact that Spanish was his second language, or if it was because, as he had told us earlier, he was hard of hearing. Turning to Louisa I said, "I'd like to ask him where he's from, because it sounds to me like Spanish might be his second language." She gave me the go-ahead, so I asked. "Guatemala," came the reply, which I relayed, and then followed it up with "Ah, ok, I wondered. Sir, you speak Spanish very well. Is it possible, though, that you speak another language as well?" "Yes," he said, "I speak K'itch'e." Bingo, I thought. Between that and being hard of hearing, it was no wonder communication had been difficult. So we asked the OT's question in a different way, and continued "evaluating his mental clarity". She had him take off a sock and put it back on again, just to cover all her bases.
We had finished the evaluation, and were about to leave, when I realized I wanted to do one more thing. I knew that admitting to being indigenous, admitting to Spanish not being your native language, is something many Guatemalans are reluctant to do. The indigenous people of Guatemala have not been well treated by their government, and in many cases fled north to escape the Guatemalan genocide of the 80's. From what I have been able to learn so far, reaching Mexico did not mean safety. Mexico, too, has a certain amount of racism against its indigenous peoples, seeing them as backward and uneducated, and they were not happy to receive the wave of refugees. All of which are powerful reasons to keep your mouth shut and try to blend in as much as possible, and deny, deny, deny that you speak anything but Spanish. So to thank this man for his bravery, and to show that I didn't think any less of him, I decided to ask him if he would teach me a simple word in his mother tongue.
This would be the furthest I had gone out of my role as a conduit between OT and patient, which is my main role as an interpreter. Although I had intervened to clarify his linguistic history, that still fell within the bounds of maintaining good communication in the interest of quality care. But this was a little different. I looked at Louisa, and asked her if it she minded the question. As I'd expected, she said no, that's fine. Louisa knows a good bit about Hispanic people who speak "dialects" herself, having worked exclusively with that population for a while. So I asked. "Excuse me sir, how do you say hello in K'itch'e?" He was taken aback by the question. "What?" "How would you say 'hello' in your language, in K'itch'e?" He hesitated. Looked away. Swung himself back from the edge of the bed. I started to worry that K'itch'e might be one of those languages where you have to know the gender of the speaker, and the right honorific to be able to decide how to form a simple "hello". When he finally spoke, he said something that took me by surprise. "You know, I haven't spoken K'itch'e in 10 years, so I'm not sure." "Oh," I stammered. Then tried to cover up the embarrassment for both of us. "Oh, ok, that's fine. I just wondered, you know, but don't worry about it, that's ok." He rallied. "But I can tell you to say 'how are you?'" So he did, and I tried my best to imitate him. He said it several times, and I knew I hadn't said it well, but I was so grateful he'd managed to save face and hadn't gotten offended that I didn't mind.
Later I tried to recall and memorize his face as he spoke to me, teaching me that simple phrase as if I was a child. I could only imagine how many people had surely talked to him just like that over the years, trying to teach him simple phrases in the language that had swallowed him whole when he entered this country.
The interaction left me with so many questions. How come he has been here for so long, yet not connected with the Maya community here? How does he feel about not having spoken his mother tongue with anyone for the last 10 years? How does he get by in the city, on the streets, without being able to talk to anyone around him? Was he content with his situation? How did he get here? How does a pebble feel in an ocean? I had so many questions that I couldn't ask.
When I arrive, the therapist says they already tried the phones, but the interpreter was having some trouble understanding the patient. So, as so often happens when a patient tries to talk and no one understands them, instead of wondering what other barriers might exist to communication, someone decided to ask 'is he thinking clearly?' Of course, once the question is asked, they have to check, and that was what this OT had been asked to do. Fortunately, the therapist was gracious, and declared herself perfectly happy to see another patient on the same floor first while I went and finished up with my ICU patient. "Thanks dear, just come find me when you're done." So I went and took care of the paperwork, sat with the grieving, but capable family in the ICU, and headed on back to the other ward.
The patient was in one of two beds in a room partitioned by a thin pink plastic curtain. I looked to the clunky hospital bed, surrounded by awkward, dingily colored hospital furniture and found it empty. The OT, Louisa, knocked on the door. There was a faint reply, so we waited. Louisa turned to me, "I have no idea how to say his name," she said, and pointed it out to me on a piece of paper with cramped little boxes denoting patient's names, locations, medical record numbers, and some scribbled notes. The name read like something that wasn't quite Spanish, and I wondered aloud if perhaps this man was from Guatemala, with a name of indigenous origin. Just then, our patient came out of the bathroom. He was a short, solidly built man with a square face, wrinkled and weathered a warm brown, and the dignified way he carried himself made me like him immediately.
We introduced ourselves, she in English, I repeating both our names in Spanish, and he waved his hands "No spikee Eenglish" he said. I felt a pang of sadness as I realized how well practiced that particular phrase was, and that he hadn't heard us. I spoke louder. "Sí señor, para eso estoy yo. Voy a ser su interprete." "Yes sir, that's why I'm here. I'm going to be your interpreter." He got it, but said, "I'm sorry miss, I don't hear very well out of this ear." 'Aha,' I thought, 'THAT's why the phone interpreter had trouble understanding him.' So I readjusted my position in the room, and my speaking volume, and we got going.
We asked him what his plans were once he was discharged. Where did he live? As he answered, I began to notice that he spoke Spanish like it was his second language, like other people I've worked with who were speakers of indigenous languages from Guatemala, southern Mexico and Belize. Strike two against the phone interpreter. In answer to Louisa's question he told us he lived in a shelter, and named a homeless shelter in the city. "So what do you do during the day, when the shelter closes?" Louisa asked "In the summer when it's warm, I'm just on the street. When it's cold out, there are other shelters I go to." The story that began to emerge as we asked questions and listened to the man's answers was one I was familiar with. Several of my neighbors, the ones from when I lived one of the most impoverished, abandoned neighborhoods in my city, had told similar stories. They explained to me that shelters kicked you out early, by 5:30 or 6 in the morning; that you have to be in line at the shelter by early afternoon to secure your spot; that there are a lot of churches that hand out meals, and soup. But one of his answers to the questions we were asking added a whole new dimension to this homeless lifestyle.
"Sir, do you have any friends, or family in the area that you could stay with?" Louisa continued. Just about every homeless man I've known has had "people," meaning family, living somewhere. But before I could even finish getting the question out in Spanish, he started shaking his head. "No, estoy yo solo." "No, I'm all by myself." He continued: "Yo vivo con 250 negros," he made a wide, cirlcling gesture with his hands, as if he were surrounded, "yo soy el único hispano. Hay un cubano negro que habla un poquito de Español, pero no mucho." I interpreted: "I live with 250 black men, and I'm the only hispanic. There's one black cuban guy who speaks a little Spanish, but not much." In my mind, I could clearly see him, the only short, solidly built, hispanic man, among his black roommates, line-mates, and dinner companions, not a friend among them. I imagined him in the shelter, his warm, worn brown skin so light it might not even register as brown compared to those around him. I tried to comprehend how isolating it must be for him among his 250 roommates, streetmates, if his best English phrase was what he had given us before: "No spikee Eenglish" No wonder he shook his head so quickly, with such gravity.
She asked another question, and we had some trouble getting it across, so I intervened. My professional curiosity was getting to me, and I decided it was time to find out. I couldn't tell if the problem was the fact that Spanish was his second language, or if it was because, as he had told us earlier, he was hard of hearing. Turning to Louisa I said, "I'd like to ask him where he's from, because it sounds to me like Spanish might be his second language." She gave me the go-ahead, so I asked. "Guatemala," came the reply, which I relayed, and then followed it up with "Ah, ok, I wondered. Sir, you speak Spanish very well. Is it possible, though, that you speak another language as well?" "Yes," he said, "I speak K'itch'e." Bingo, I thought. Between that and being hard of hearing, it was no wonder communication had been difficult. So we asked the OT's question in a different way, and continued "evaluating his mental clarity". She had him take off a sock and put it back on again, just to cover all her bases.
We had finished the evaluation, and were about to leave, when I realized I wanted to do one more thing. I knew that admitting to being indigenous, admitting to Spanish not being your native language, is something many Guatemalans are reluctant to do. The indigenous people of Guatemala have not been well treated by their government, and in many cases fled north to escape the Guatemalan genocide of the 80's. From what I have been able to learn so far, reaching Mexico did not mean safety. Mexico, too, has a certain amount of racism against its indigenous peoples, seeing them as backward and uneducated, and they were not happy to receive the wave of refugees. All of which are powerful reasons to keep your mouth shut and try to blend in as much as possible, and deny, deny, deny that you speak anything but Spanish. So to thank this man for his bravery, and to show that I didn't think any less of him, I decided to ask him if he would teach me a simple word in his mother tongue.
This would be the furthest I had gone out of my role as a conduit between OT and patient, which is my main role as an interpreter. Although I had intervened to clarify his linguistic history, that still fell within the bounds of maintaining good communication in the interest of quality care. But this was a little different. I looked at Louisa, and asked her if it she minded the question. As I'd expected, she said no, that's fine. Louisa knows a good bit about Hispanic people who speak "dialects" herself, having worked exclusively with that population for a while. So I asked. "Excuse me sir, how do you say hello in K'itch'e?" He was taken aback by the question. "What?" "How would you say 'hello' in your language, in K'itch'e?" He hesitated. Looked away. Swung himself back from the edge of the bed. I started to worry that K'itch'e might be one of those languages where you have to know the gender of the speaker, and the right honorific to be able to decide how to form a simple "hello". When he finally spoke, he said something that took me by surprise. "You know, I haven't spoken K'itch'e in 10 years, so I'm not sure." "Oh," I stammered. Then tried to cover up the embarrassment for both of us. "Oh, ok, that's fine. I just wondered, you know, but don't worry about it, that's ok." He rallied. "But I can tell you to say 'how are you?'" So he did, and I tried my best to imitate him. He said it several times, and I knew I hadn't said it well, but I was so grateful he'd managed to save face and hadn't gotten offended that I didn't mind.
Later I tried to recall and memorize his face as he spoke to me, teaching me that simple phrase as if I was a child. I could only imagine how many people had surely talked to him just like that over the years, trying to teach him simple phrases in the language that had swallowed him whole when he entered this country.
The interaction left me with so many questions. How come he has been here for so long, yet not connected with the Maya community here? How does he feel about not having spoken his mother tongue with anyone for the last 10 years? How does he get by in the city, on the streets, without being able to talk to anyone around him? Was he content with his situation? How did he get here? How does a pebble feel in an ocean? I had so many questions that I couldn't ask.
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