The Intern Blues(51)
I’m feeling better now, I’m not feeling depressed, I’m starting to feel like there’s an end in sight. I know it’s too early to be saying that, but if you look at it, there’s twelve months in this year. A hundred divided by 12: That’s 81⁄3 percent of the internship per month. At the end of this month, I’ll have completed four months; that’s 331⁄3 percent. If you add in vacation time, well, then you’re at 412⁄3 percent. So at the end of this month, if you include vacation time, which is really free time, I’ll have completed over 40 percent of my internship. Not bad! Not bad at all! Forty percent: That has a definite, hefty ring to it. Forty percent! That means I have survived the beginning. I really have, I’ve gotten through the hell of being an early intern. Whatever hell lies ahead, and I’m sure there’s more, at least this has been survived.
Sunday, October 13, 1985, Late at Night
My parents have gone. I felt kind of lonely after they left. I sat down and did a little paperwork, paid a bill, wrote a letter to somebody, and I feel a little better now. It bummed me out because I have to go into work tomorrow and be on call. And I know I need a vacation, I know I need it, but I’ll just have to wait. I know I’ll make it.
I’ll just have to wait.
It’ll be so great.
To be on vacation
And to sleep late.
Friday, October 18, 1985
Postcall. Cleared my bed for roaches. In bed here, getting ready to make the big snooze after a rough night on call at University Hospital. Tomorrow I’ve got to decide what to do with my life. I’ve been talking with the director of the program I originally wanted to go to up in Boston. He says there’s a place for me back there for next year if I want it. I have to decide if I should stay or if I should go. I don’t know what the fuck to do, and I’m too tired to think about it now.
Yesterday I got my first kid with AIDS; actually it’s ARC [AIDS-related complex], but still, it’s the first kid I ever admitted with the big “A.” I don’t know, it’s no big deal; it’s just another horrible, fatal disease. Our team got a talk from the immunologist about the disease. Part of it was about health workers with AIDS, and every one of us started wondering if we had it. We were wondering whether we, the people who suck meconium out of the mouths of newborns have gotten AIDS yet. Who knows? Sometimes I think maybe I should go and get myself tested or something. Then at other times I think, what difference does it make?
I had dinner tonight with Ellen. Bought a little Indian food and came back here and ate it. She conked out and went home. That’s life when your only friends are interns.
Monday, October 21, 1985
I didn’t get much sleep last night, less than an hour. It was a pretty hard night at University. Goddamn renal transplant patient came in! Nice kid for a whining three-year-old. Got his mom’s kidney. Jesus Christ, I think the nephrology attendings sit around just thinking of more tests they can order. Anyway, they transplanted the kidney and the kid looked like a million bucks afterward. I hadn’t slept all day, and I looked like about thirty cents! I spent two fucking hours in the recovery room; it seemed like I was in there forever. Before the kid came in, there were like a thousand people, a big commotion, everybody wanted to get involved. Then when they saw nothing too exciting was happening, they all split and all of a sudden it was me sitting there alone. All the nurses, all the nephrologists, all the surgeons, they were gone! There’s just this kid and I’m in charge. It turned out to be no big deal; nothing happened. I had to make a couple of decisions, but hey, I think I know how to do that. But I didn’t get much sleep.
And so what do I do? I get out of work, come home, and stay awake for like three hours! I could have gone to sleep at like seven or eight o’clock. I’m totally overtired. I slept through half of attending rounds today. I didn’t even make any bones about it, I just leaned on my elbow and went to sleep. I must be crazy!
I don’t know, I guess I just like to come home and pretend I have a life or something. So you know what I wound up doing tonight? I watched TV. I haven’t sat and watched TV since well before my internship. Isn’t that interesting? Very interesting. Interesting as a pond of mud.
Tomorrow’s Tuesday, and Mike Miller is probably going to ask me what I’m planning to do next year. I don’t know what the fuck I’m going to tell him. I don’t know if I’m going to tell him the truth about this job offer in Boston or what. I’m still trying to make up my mind about it. It depends a lot on Karen, too. She has to decide whether she wants to do her internship in Boston or come down here to one of the real hot shit New York programs. I tried to call her tonight to talk to her about it, but she wasn’t home.