Rx: A Time Capsule to be taken in 10 years

Hey guys! I hope that you all are doing well - especially in the Philippines where it had been raining non-stop!

So today, I will get a little cheesy and kindly pardon our blog post for today. It isn't a health-related article but it was supposed to be a submission of an essay under the category of classic non-fiction entry under the Philippine College of Physician. Unfortunately, I was not able to meet the deadline due to my hectic schedule, and also because I was procrastinating doing this essay. However, I still want to share what I wrote to you my readers - because somewhere, even in another country, your past self also wants to send you this letter. So here it goes :)

It was 1985. Somewhere in the Philippines, an anxious, dreamy-eyed kid was staring at an envelope. You could see the trembling of the hands while holding that piece of paper. Sweat ran down the forehead, while both the eyes were deadlocked on the envelope as if aiming through a sniper’s scope.

Then, suddenly, the kid jumped, rushed to both the parents, and yelled, “Hooray!”

The results of the National Medical Admission Test had arrived by snail mail—which meant that this aspiring medical student could finally enroll in the medical school of choice.

I hope you still remember that moment—the same moment as that kid, which felt as though all our dreams had come true. But alas, I guess you are too busy these days that you may have forgotten it: the starting point of our life in medicine.

How are you doing?

I hope you haven’t forgotten to take care of yourself. I honestly believe that you are still chasing your dreams and aspirations, perhaps even at the cost of neglecting yourself. That is one of the things I don’t really admire about you—you help others, you lift others up, and you look out for everyone around you, but you rarely stop to think about your own well-being.

But I guess I might be wrong. And I really do hope that I am wrong about this part of you.

How about me, you ask?

Well, for starters, I am currently here at the clinic, waiting for a patient to come.

Each passing day is much like this. Very few patients walk into the clinic and ask to be seen by a new and young internal medicine doctor. Sometimes, it gets to me—the feeling that I am not needed, and that I am somehow in competition with other doctors for patients, hoping to finally gain some traction in my private practice.

It has been half a year since I started, but I still see fewer than two patients a day—on most days, none at all. It is just the eerie silence and the sound of my own breathing keeping me company.

There are days when I feel depressed and disheartened. I endured my years as a medical student. I developed grit and resilience throughout residency training so that I could graduate and become a diplomate in internal medicine. Yet somehow, starting my own practice has challenged me in an entirely different way.

My private practice is what they call nilalangaw.

But I still show up.

For the past few months, I have continued going to the clinic, paying my rental fees, sitting in this room, and waiting for a patient to come through the door. Sometimes, I wonder whether the consultants I looked up to during residency also had their fair share of days like these—days spent waiting, wondering, and questioning whether they had chosen the right path.

It is a good thing that I can work as a government physician or even as a company physician so that the bills get paid. Still, sometimes—no, most of the time—I think about working as a doctor abroad, somewhere the pay might be better and work-life balance might be more achievable than it is here in the country we call home.

I wonder what you eventually chose.

Where are you now? Did you stay? Did you leave? Did the clinic eventually fill with patients? Did you pursue another path entirely?

Whatever happened, I hope that as you read this, your past comes rushing back to you in an instant: all the sleepless nights, all the days and nights spent on duty at the hospital, and now, all these quiet days sitting alone in the clinic, waiting.

I hope you remember them not with regret, but with gratitude.

I understand that by now, you probably have new dreams, new goals, and a different vision for your life. But always remember that I was once here, trying to get to where you are standing.

And I hope you never forget the tenacity it took to get there.

So wherever you are and whoever you have become, take a moment to look back at me—the young internist sitting alone in his clinic, uncertain about what tomorrow will bring, but still choosing to show up.

I am still waiting.

Not only for the next patient to walk through the door, but also for the life that you are already living.

P.S. Don’t forget about me, my future self.

Sincerely,

Every newly registered diplomate starting their private practice

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