What living through the pandemic has shown me to be true.
Tags: Covid 19, Meaning Of Life, Pandemic, Community, Social

What living through the pandemic has shown me to be true. SubjectMatters Apr 7·5 min read

Without a doubt the last year or so has been trying, trying but in a different way than that of my grandfather who lived through WWII and the Great Depression. Trying, but in a different way than my mother and father who lived through The Vietnam War and the civil rights movement. This last year has been hard in that it has been isolating. I imagine we all feel a little bit tired from doing nothing. It’s kind of like when a superstar athlete gets an injury and instead of lifting heavier weights, or running further they are told to just sit still. It feels almost counter productive. I have been fortunate to keep my job, My wife has held her job as well. We are in fact very lucky that our standard of living has changed very little since the pandemic began. Yet, we are both exposed daily to those of whom have suffered greatly this last year. She, a 4th grade teacher, for a time was answering her student’s’ questions about COVID-19 noticing that their inquiries were stained with just a hint of fear in their tone. She has had students who have had parents lose jobs, been forced to move, and even lost loved ones. For me, practicing medicine during this time has been one the greatest honors and privileges of my very short professional career. It is a blessing to say that while the world stood still I was able to go to work and try to help. This being said, I have learned a great deal about myself and humanity through this time and have noted them as follows.

We are Social Creatures, The meaning of life is in our relationships, Movement is life.

We are social creatures.

Without a doubt one of the biggest complaints about the pandemic has been the isolation, the lock downs, and the social distancing. We are by nature social creatures. Our ape-like ancestors were, the neanderthals moved in groups, the nomads after them had tribes and now we settle in cities and communities near our loved ones. We are social creatures. This has been all but stripped from us at this point and has made the prevalence of depression, anxiety and sadness grow significantly. It can be difficult to weigh the risk vs benefits to social isolation in a pandemic. But trust me, as someone who stood over a 50 year old gentleman as he was gasping for his last breaths because COVID took his lungs from him, I promise you it was worth it. Not easy, but worth it. My mother used to tell me that anything worth doing wasn’t going to be easy and this holds true for our social distancing and lockdowns. Recently, since both my wife and I have been vaccinated and the CDC updated their social distancing guidelines, we had her family up to visit for her birthday. She was elated. She had a peace about her that I had not seen in… well, about a year. We as humans rely on our social interactions to find connection, relate our feelings to those of others, gauge our responses based on others and judge our conditions, both emotional and physical, off of others.

Community, family and friends, are our link to the world and carry great impact on our health and well being. This brings me to my second lesson learned this year…

The meaning of life is our relationships.

You are the company you keep, judge a man by the friends he surrounds himself with, it takes a village, etc… Each of these phrases applies to different aspects of our lives and yet has one singular common thread, relationships. I don’t mean to sound like I am on a soap box here so forgive me but here goes… I have had the unique privilege to care for many elderly people in the emergency department. I have made it a habit to try and ask them about their lives, ask about their success and their regrets. After 3 years of practicing emergency medicine and probably a hundred of these conversations I can tell you that not a single person talked about anything other than family, friends and loved ones. No one said, “Gee I’m really proud that I worked 80 hour work weeks” or “I’m just so thrilled that I was able to make millions before my time came.” Earlier I mentioned that 50 year old gentleman who eventually went on to die from covid in front of me despite our best efforts. I can tell you without hesitation none of his family members mentioned his job, his money, or his professional accolades as they mourned over his body. They told stories, shared tears and laughs. They remembered him through his relationships. It was his interactions that had given his life meaning. How he had made his wife feel their wedding night, and again when they had their first child. How he was the only one standing clapping for his daughter’s first dance recital. These were the things they remembered, the things they cherished.

This message hits hard, can be difficult to acknowledge, and to adjust to but in my humble opinion we have been doing life all wrong. If we spent half the energy we did on climbing the corporate ladder, buying the next fancy toy but measuring our success on building meaningful relationships our final and most vulnerable moments would be more impactful, less vulnerable and bring us peace. Ironically, in doing so we will also live a more fulfilled life and the journey will be more enjoyable so that we won’t place such an emphasis on our final moments. I prefer to look at life like a symphony, Beethoven’s 9th is not great because of those final notes but rather everything that comes between the first and final chords.

The final thing this pandemic has taught me is…

Movement is life.

I know everyone says to exercise. Eat healthy, do this, don’t do that. Perhaps this message isn’t born just out of the pandemic but a culmination of thoughts and observations from my so far short career. Yet, I remain persuaded in its truth; Movement is life. I have yet to see someone who exercised regularly (and didn’t smoke) die or have an ICU admission from COVID. In fact it is extremely rare for someone who regularly exercises to be admitted to the hospital at all minus the occasional trauma. Movement gives us strength, purpose, and confidence. It allows us to breath, our heart to beat, it allows us to live. I mean this both literally and figuratively. While exercise will keep you physically healthy, the ability to get out of bed, out of the recliner, to see friends and family, to not be a burden on those around you, these things will enhance your life and give it meaning. The path to meaningful relationships, to community, to being a social creature starts and ends with our health. Ask any ER nurse if they have had to clean up an adult who was too heavy to get out of bed to use the bathroom and they will surely have horror stories. Ask any COPD patient if they wish they could keep up with their grandkids on a walk and they will tell you they can’t because they are struggling for breath.

We are social creatures, community and relationships give us purpose and yet the machine we use to achieve these things needs to be exercised, used and cared for. These are the lessons I have learned from a year of pandemic medicine. A year of watching people die younger and younger. A year of despair, and sadness. But also, now, a year of hope. A year of innovation, determination and shared struggle. A year of life.

-SubjectMatters Team