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Growing up in an Indian household, I was the eldest of three from a middle-class family. My father was a policeman and mom was a staff nurse who later became a nurse manager. I was educated in a government co-ed school and like the most of us, I was hoping to be successful in the future too. Never once I've thought about what life had for me in the future. Oh! Maybe I wasn’t supposed to at that time *coughs*. My father was strict so was my mom. Education and good conduct were always their priority, but of course, rules were meant to be broken. I wouldn’t claim myself as a super bright student, but I did perform well and maintained my grades all the while. Like many of them who were in my generation, I too answered “I want to be a doctor when I grow up” when the question of ambition was raised. Well, I may have not meant it at that time but yes that’s what I pursue today.
Having my mother in the medical field she often made me do things or learn things which
many didn’t at my age. She taught me the names of medicine, specialty fields, etc. As I grew
older and set my foot into secondary school, she started to tell me more of what happens in
the life of a doctor. It was more of her giving me an alarm on the job scope of a medical doctor.
I wouldn’t say she was discouraging me, but she always made sure I knew the worst side of
it and remained my thoughts of pursuing medicine as a career of choice. She enlightened me
that medicine is not the job if one wishes to have a lavish lifestyle and a very relaxed
working environment. I was able to make up my mind by the age of 16 that I would take up
medicine despite knowing the dark side of it while my friends still dreamt of becoming rich as
a doctor and being able to open clinics to have own practice after graduating. Thanks, mom!
So.... Yes, SPM (the Malaysian high school assessment) was over and I did well to qualify
myself into a Foundation in Science program which I thought is the best pathway to reach an
MBBS/MD (medical degrees). Foundation in Science was more of a very general introduction
to science fields where subjects like Biology, Chemistry, and Physics are taught in deeper
aspects and the institution I enrolled had subjects like Health Science, Basic Anatomy and
Physiology and Genetics as a part of the program. Fine enough, I did well here too. Now the
time to make a very crucial decision of my life arrived.
Am I still interested to pursue medicine? If yes, where do I do it? Can my parents support my studies financially?
All these questions started to jumble up in my mind and putting up a whole set of confusion. After finishing a year of Foundation in Science,out of nowhere I told my dad I want to be a lawyer. Oops!
My dad was against that and for the first time he came up to me saying “I would like to
see you become a doctor”. He hadn’t said that in the past years it was only my mom who
always said: “Boy, I know you will make a great doctor”. She still says that just to motivate me
(yeap you need a lot of motivation to do medicine huh). Realizing the fact that I always
wanted to pursue this course deep in my heart, I said: “I’ll do it Pa”.
Here comes the next point of conflict, choosing the right medical school. My mom and I
went to many education fairs, spoke to many people, visited many universities just to ensure
the decision made will have no regrets later. After a month, we then decided that I’d join the
Melaka Manipal Medical College which had an MBBS program which was a twinning program.
That means I’d have to study abroad in India for 2 1⁄2 years and another 2 1⁄2 years in their
Melaka campus. I never even attended school camps for the reason of not wanting to stay out
from my comfort zone. Oh God! How did I even subscribe to this? *sigh* Filling applications,
attending interviews (I must be honest here, it was just for the policy sake, no questions about
studies were asked), many payments (it costs a lot of penny) and *tadaaa* I’m in. It was only
after I received my offer letter that I started to have palpitations and feelings that I am moving
out of my comfort zone. (Mom and dad, maybe I shouldn’t have enrolled here)
Fast forward, 2 months from there. Now I am in India, in Manipal, Karnataka. The experience
of this place alone can make me publish another set of essays, so let’s not go there. It was
the first day of class post orientation. Introduction to 3 new subjects which sounded like I knew them earlier. Anatomy, Physiology, and Biochemistry. I have to 100 percent agree that the facilities available in India to study Anatomy is way better than Malaysia. There were 10-15 of us in each group and we had one cadaver each group. There were roughly 280 students. 90% of them are Malaysians while the rests are majority Sri Lankans and some from several other countries. Anatomy cadaveric dissections were a whole new experience. We were scared in the beginning, but we learned to love the cadavers to ensure we learned the best out of it. Lectures there were very helpful and are mostly friendly (You can’t expect everyone to be nice to you right!). Physiology classes were fun as they were very much concepts of body mechanism, easy to understand as we can always relate to it. Biochemistry is a dry subject; the difficulty is honestly subject to individual preference. Regardless you got to study them all to pass your exams anyways.
That was just what was happening in the day during the classes, but what happened every
day after 5 p.m. once the bell rang indicating the end of class was something, I wish I don’t
have to go through again. Yes, I became depressed, homesickness stroked me. I would not
leave my hostel room once I returned from class. I’d not go for dinner with my friends. Never
joined them for sports, worst of all never studied since day 1. What was I doing? Just lying on
that bed, under the blanket, looking at the walls and crying. It felt so different; things were so
different. I started to regret every second I spent there. I’ll be all well in the morning, get up go
to class, engage myself and feel all good. However, when the class ends something else runs
in my mind. I became very weak and emotional, realized this wasn’t the place for me.
While the feel of regret runs in my mind every day, on the other end I was falling sick. Things
happening to me were just not right. I felt sick (no not just a cold, something more serious that
I’d not wish to mention), my mobile which was my saviour from anxiety broke. Thank God I
had a spare phone and not very long from there, that mobile too had issues. Overwhelmed by all these issues, I rang my mom and told her I want to come back. That’s not so easy, the entire cost of me getting into the school till then was almost 12000 USD. My parent’s hard-earned money. Mom is away from family to earn for me. How can I do this to them? I had no choice but to rather stay and get more sick or choose to get out of here. It wasn’t just me, many of them who came in with me also choose to leave, and some have already left within the third month.
“If only I knew this would happen earlier, I wouldn’t have come here mom”
Kind enough she agreed for me to return and then arrangements were made, and I was back home before the first internal assessment. What is going to happen now? Will I still pursue medicine? Am I going to change my course? What about all the judgemental people around me, making fun of my returning?
I needed rest, I rested till I felt better.
It was at this point where I realized how important it is to have supportive parents
and we often do not recognize them to be supportive enough in life. I received judgemental
comments from many, but never once from my parents. They were confident about my
decision and did not lose hope in me. I was given a choice to either re-enrol medicine
anywhere locally or to pursue other courses. I was clear that my returning was not caused by
the course but my health and the environment. Therefore, I took up medicine again at Taylor's
University because it was close to my home and I could travel every day. We all have different
life timelines; it need not be the same. Yes, 6 months wasted, no not really. It wasn't wasted,
it was a life trial.
Just weeks after enrolling before the classes even began, my mom had a sudden cholic
episode and was diagnosed with acute cholecystitis and had to undergo immediate surgery to
avoid from the gallbladder rupturing and causing severe illness. It was too fast that I couldn’t
catch hold of what's happening, just a week from there my classes began.
New place, new environment, and new system. Yes, they call it the integrated system, where
we learn all 6 subjects from year 1 to 2 and sit for 1 professional exam, unlike my earlier school
that had 2 university exams, each at end of the year. Classes went on smoothly, grateful
enough that whatever I learned earlier was like a revision here for me. Small class group
(25students only) allowed us to engage more. Constant revision is greatly essential in the first
phase of medical studies. This is because it is mostly theoretical and lots of information must
be embedded in our brains.
Never once should a medical student hesitate to ask questions in case there is a doubt because if you don't learn to speak here, clinical years will be even harder to catch hold of.
The basic concepts of medicine were called foundation block here and it lasted for a good one semester. Just as I was thriving through, my younger sister who is 16 had severe chest pain and I had to rush her to the hospital only to find out that this girl was severely anaemic. She needed an immediate blood transfusion. Just 3 weeks from there my younger brother who was 7 had a high fever that didn't come down even after the course of antibiotic. The hospital became my supermarket where I had to visit it monthly. My brother was diagnosed with influenza B and had his whole set of treatment going on and he was under my care. At some point, I started questioning myself if I came back from India to become a caregiver.
The first internal assessment was over, and I passed the paper at borderline. Yes, you read it
right I only passed at borderline. I wasn't sure if hadn't studied enough or did not understand
what I was doing. Good enough, I wasn't alone. Many of them scored similarly to me. I learned
that there is a lot more to this course than just mugging up the notes. Thank god, I did well in
the following assessments. It was almost the end of semester one when it was my turn to be
the guest of the supermarket, I mean the hospital. I was down with grade 3 tonsillitis and
severe lip infection. Lost my voice, and my lips lost its architecture. Hahaha! The doctor said
I have herpes simplex infection on my lips, but how is that possible? I have not had any sexual
contact with anyone. I started to feel so bad about myself until I was told that it can even
happen when one travels to crowded places. Oh, just a week before that I was on a yatra
(prayer tour) around a few states of the country. It took me 2 weeks to recover making my
study break to be left with 4 days.
3 days post discharge it was a normal day, as usual, went to bed. Within an hour’s time heard
my brother calling for me saying my dad is behaving one kind, rushed to his room only to
realize that he was seizing. Yes, a seizure, never seen that before. Thanks to some basic
clinical knowledge that my mom taught me back then. Kept him in the left lateral position and
made sure everything was fine before I went on looking for help. In a few minutes, he
recovered and was back to normal although he was at a little confused state. He has his own
medical history. He was getting ready at 11 p.m. post the seizure as if he was getting ready to
work. He went on taking bath despite me stopping him and put on his uniform. It took me a
while to console him that he had a seizure attack and it's only 11 p.m. On my mother's advice
we went to the hospital that has his records to get him checked. He was all fine, the CT brain
was clear, every vital sign was as normal as any healthy adult. He had a headache, so the
doctor just prescribed a painkiller and then he was good to go. We live quite far from the
hospital, so we suggested that he'd be put in observation for a day just in case he has another
episode of seizure. The doctors agreed and so did my father. My father was making all kind
of funny jokes teasing the staffs and doctors and asked me to get him 'nasi lemak' when I
come back in the morning. I left him at 5.45 a.m. asking him to take rest.
At 6.45 a.m. as I stepped into my house, I received a phone call from an unknown number, I
answered.
Staff: "Hi is this Mr. Thanabalan's son",
Me: "Yes I am","
Staff: Your dad's condition is a little serious and we need you to be here ASAP",
Me: "What? I just came back home, he was all well when I left",
Staff: "It would be better if you could come here so that we can discuss better and it not ethical
to be discussing on the phone",
Me: " I'll be there".
I got my car keys and rushed my sister along with me in the morning traffic of a weekday, in a panic situation. Not knowing what is going on, not knowing what I am yet to face. When I arrived in the emergency department of the hospital, I saw my dad, with tubes all over, with wires and monitors all around him. With a nurse to just look after him. I was told that he had another episode of seizure and when they brought him over to stabilize, he became unconscious and there was no pulse. He was just 53, they knew he can live, they resuscitated him for 18 minutes, yes, I saw the CPR chart. Why did this happen? The question that is still left unanswered even after 400 days(today) of that man's passing. Yes, he passed away after being in the ICU for 11 days. That period of 11 days alone can let me write a whole book on its experience.
I missed my final internal exam for semester one. I was given a resit on a date I wasn't ready to sit for. I was eventually given an F instead of an 'Absent'. How does that affect? It gives 0 marks to the pointer instead of getting exempted. Automatically making my semester one grades low. Glad enough that I did well in semester two internals to qualify me to progress to year 2.
It didn't just end there, I faced lots more after that. Depression, suicidal, humiliation and many
more. I wish to say something to everyone. Life is very unpredictable, my dad walked into the
hospital but left in a coffin. By God's grace when I pass medical school someday, I too may
witness another person going through everything that I did. What will differ then is how I take
it. Evolution is the key to survival. Every day we evolve to match our environment. There is a
lot more to life than good grades, degrees, relationships, etc. No matter what comes upon you
if you've persevered towards your goal, you'll make it there.
You may be lazy, demotivated or even tired of life but remember, your existence has a purpose. Discover that purpose.
When you learn the purpose of your existence you aim towards your goal. You eventually will reach it regardless of how long it takes. Just like that medical school isn't just a place you get
your degree. It is a temple of life where you evolve, become persevered, learn the
purpose of your existence and travel towards your goal. If you stepped in here with determination, you'll make a way out of this place with lots of treasures. If only you are forced
in here, you will go lost. So have a stand of your own and make sure you know what you want.
Even after all that happened in my life, I never lost hope in myself. I was ready to even face
failures in exams but never to leave this course. I believe in destiny. It was my destiny to leave
for India, to come back, to become a caregiver, to fail, to lose my loved one. It was my destiny,
the journey of life towards the purpose of existence, not a barrier just a way maker. If only I
knew all these would happen earlier, I would have prepared myself to face it and
recovered way faster than I did now. You don’t always get chance to change everything
that happens in life, but you can opt to be aware of it and learn to tackle the issues.
I truly appreciate you if you read up to here. Above is just a super summary of my life events, I have skipped many important ones as it may become a thesis on its own if I wrote them all. I wish to dedicate this to everyone who looks up to coming into medical school, less of a medical story more of life story because we're a human being first and everything else is next. Love your life, it guides you the right way.
Dinesh Gill is currently a 2nd year medical student at Taylor's University. He describes himself as an older soul in a younger body that looks old.