I watched these flowers yesterday and felt a message springing up within!
Yesterday, I was still trying to close the day at 6.30 pm with some more entries to be made in the register of children whom I welcomed during the day in the out-patient service. As I was about to start after the farewell to the last family, a colleague took the register to make the entries while I completed writing the notes of the last child in the hospital chart. All my colleagues got delayed yesterday. The working hours close for them at 4.30 pm. They had families to take care till then, as some families arrived late for the developmental appraisal. I felt touched by this gesture of three of them sitting down to complete the entires of six children in the register. Another professional was engaged in debriefing a family before the farewell!
That is when I remembered the sight of the bunch of flowers I spotted in our garden in the morning. The confluence of the red flowers gave a rich and colourful appearance. The charm and charisma of people working together is refreshing and is worth celebrating.
At the car park of the hospital I had noticed a solitary flower in an earthen pond in the morning. Its elegance and brilliance was captivating. Its lone presence reduced its richness to some extent. I hope there would be more flowers in that pool of water in the days to come.
There is meaning in both of these situations. We need the collaborative culture to make the confluence of strength larger than the arithmetic sum of our individual abilities. We need the individual development and maturity to feel comfortable to share our resources with others and feel delighted to share the joy of outcome with others.
It was year back, a former colleague mentioned to me that, 'my golden years of work is over and it was good to retire and have someone else take responsibilities of the developmental paediatric services'! That message was shared with others in the department and outside. We usually welcomed 50 children in a month for about a year at that time. The decline in the numbers for consultations from about 200 children in a month to 50 during a year or so embarrassed me. The administration while talking about it told me, 'patients come in large numbers when a doctor is good at his work'!
These two experiences shattered me and left me ready to resign and move away from a situation where I felt discredited and unwanted. I felt constrained to do so because, it is better to quit when the going is good rather than when the going is rough because of a valley experience. That is how I decided to stay on in March 2021. That was the COVID season. I was advised to stay away from work due to increased risk due to my cardiac co-morbidity and advanced age. I felt differently. It was during such a season that families would need support and attention even more. Except for a short while when the hospital was crowded with many patients of COVID, we were able to offer consultation physically and on line mode during the last one year.
For the last six months I am surprised that the number of children who visit us is now reaching the earlier numbers and might exceed that with the trend that we see now. Some families who stopped visiting us after 2017, as they had a long waiting period even upto three months to get appointments, returned to share the story of how they felt disappointed as they were not able to find help when they needed help. With many families having shared similar stories I wondered how that was what was conveyed to families when I could have welcomed at least ten families each day! That was the dark period of the department, staying on for about two years.
Since we transferred the booking for consultation to the hospital booking counter a year back, we witnessed a gradual return to the pre-2017 numbers. Now it is the challenge of confining the work to working hours so that all of us can return home on time rather than stay longer hours at work!
Yesterday when I watched the collaborative spirit in yet another way, even at the end of the day when all of them were tired , I remembered the confluence of flowers in the plant.
The work culture is collaborative and brings an ambience of camaraderie!
I returned home past 7.30 pm yesterday celebrating a new ambience that has set in, in the department. Since the break down of communication a year back when I felt alienated from the rest, it has been a slow and steady process to restore trust and acceptance!
Most days during the last one year I went to work and returned from work tearfully and sorrowfully, wondering how the work place was a place of distance and strained relationships. In five other institutions where I worked earlier, I had experiences of delight and fellowship at work place.
During the last one year, having faced a valley experience of doubts and apprehensions, there is a new light at the end of the tunnel.
The water lily flower in the earthen pond became a hope giving symbol yesterday remind me that the season of flowering after a season of drought is forthcoming!
There is hope of better times, even when we have to endure and wait!
M.C.Mathew (text and photo)
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