Corona Warriors: Fear and fight in the medical room
Every doctor, every policeman, and every health service personnel has a fight much bigger than the pandemic itself — the fight against their own fears.
You have clapped, clanged utensils, lit diyas to salute their bravery. Those on the frontlines of this war against the coronavirus. But there’s another side. Every doctor, every policeman, and every health service personnel has a fight much bigger than the pandemic itself — the fight against their own fears. Yes, they are doctors, policemen, sanitisation workers, but they are human beings first. They get scared too, and beating that fear requires mental strength.
A medical professional has a clear idea of the situation, his own vulnerability to catching an infection, the effect of the infection, and the risk associated with being in a hospital. Responding to the call of duty is more like a face-off with your own internal fears. You know you are playing with fire that may scald your family members, the elderly, and the children. This is where mental strength comes into play. Some real-life incidents of doctors will be helpful in understanding this game between fear and motivation running in one’s mind.
Dr RK Khanna, who has been practising medicine for nearly 60 years and has been one of the strongest pillars of our hospital over many years, got his grandson’s wedding scheduled before the lockdown. Right before the wedding, the lockdown was announced and his children and grandchildren could not land in India as all international flights were cancelled. The wedding had to be called off. Now he and his wife are all alone here, with their family stuck thousands of miles away.
Dr Khanna has seen numerous ups and downs in his life, has bravely faced the severest of hardships during his tenure. However, this time, he is engulfed by fear. The size of the fear is just a few microns. He has ‘what-if’ nightmares. What if any of his children were to get infected? What if he lost his companion? Or what if he went down to this ‘bloody sh*t’, as he calls it. He doesn’t want to go wrapped in polythene bags. In the middle of a nightmare, he even ran out of his bed and hurt himself. He calls up his junior doctors several times a day to inquire if they are equipped enough to ‘save him’. He often tells one of them to come and sit with him for the simple reason that he feels ‘safe’.
My husband, Dr Amit Jindal, who works at the Department of Cardiology in the same hospital, came in contact with coronavirus-positive patients twice during his duties at the hospital. Though he has been taking all the precautionary measures, by wearing a protective kit, washing his hands regularly, using disinfectant gel on hands, drinking hot water, gargling, and so on, he could not but give in to the fear of the spread of infection to his family. With old parents and small children waiting for him all the time and praying for his safety and well-being in this petrifying era, he refuses to come home. He got himself self-quarantined both times, away from family, all alone, just to ensure that if by chance he had caught an infection, others should be safe from him. He meets them over video calls.
Children ask him “Papa! kaise ho? (Father! How are you?)” and “Tabiyat to theek hai? (Is your health alright?)”, and he has to put up a brave face every time while emotionally this breaks him. Both sides on the video call fake a smile and strength, fighting back tears so that the person on the other side feels comfortable. This has already been a long battle for our family and isn’t ending soon.
Another colleague Dr DK Sharma, who works at a highly reputed hospital abroad, has his parents in Varanasi. While he is a determined Corona Warrior, at the back of his mind is a big question: How will he reach out to his parents if they need him? He is not sure whether he will be able to stay safe during this global emergency.
My friends, Dr Ajit Rai and Dr Pakhi Rai, are working at a government hospital in Dehradun to save infected patients. They are treated like gods for their dedication and competence. But their daughters have not seen them for over two months now. The girls are with their grandparents at Gurugram to stay away from their parents.
In the most recent incident, a young female dermatologist was brought to the casualty unit of the hospital with complaints of pleuric chest pain. Upon investigation, her Covid test was found to be negative and her X-ray was absolutely normal. What she actually required was a healing touch to just ‘feel’ that she was being attended to. After a brief interaction, she opened up about the fear that she was actually engulfed by. Her Head of Department had come in contact with a coronavirus-positive patient, after which his entire family was running temperature and were sent to quarantine.
The same day, she came across the news of a Delhi Police constable who was brought with complaints of fever and difficulty in breathing to the hospital where she was working. The man was dead within 24 hours. Since then, she started having panic attacks. The fear in her mind was so intense that while narrating her story, she started crying uncontrollably and kept mumbling and pleaded to conduct all possible tests on her — CTPA, D Dimer angiography, HRCT, etc. She had to be counselled for hours by the doctors before being sent home. She went back, though it is quite obvious that she will be joining her duties as soon as she recovers from this trauma.
Dr Ratish Aggarwal, a single, budding brilliance, who is yet to see the springs of his life and career, had been running a fever — despite taking the utmost precautions with his PPE kit, gloves, masks, face shield, and all possible covers.
In the Corona era, the word ‘fever’ is more horrifying than any of the worst monsters on the planet. Dr Aggarwal had been staying aloof over the past few days and with this ‘fever’, old trail of thoughts engulfed him, this time with greater amplitude. He started having panic attacks, cried vehemently, and faced the worst nightmares. The situation was more dangerous as he lived all alone. He started calling up colleagues repeatedly and cried like a baby.
It was not too late for his friends and department colleagues to realise the gravity of his trauma besides understanding that it was caused largely due to loneliness. They immediately brought him to the hospital and got him admitted. Beyond words of expression, this small effort of doctors and a little connection with a few people, had a soothing effect on Dr Ratish, enough to help him gain his lost internal strength. Covid-positive or not, he was going to fight. He is now recovering fast in the hospital and luckily, his Covid test was found negative.
The time is tough, but the era belongs to the toughest.
What we had to be confronted with is already here — cruel, tyrant, dominating, and petrifying. Being scared of the tiny stubborn virus is natural. We are already in Phase-3 of the virus-spread, where the number of people infected is rising exponentially day by day, minute by minute. No treatment so far! But we must remember that being worried and depressed can do us no good to better our tomorrow. It will only work to reduce our immunity, making us more vulnerable to it. Thus it is mandatory to keep our spirits high and fears aside. Times are crucial and testing. Winning over fear is the war half-won. Be positive if you don’t want to be Covid-positive.