The Little I Have To Give.
Do you ever have those days where you feel like you have little or nothing to give?
I get it a lot. Whether it’s trying to work out what message to share through this work, to trying to help patients in my practice, to being an uncle and brother-in-law, to being a husband, a father, a friend.
Some days, it just feels like whatever I have to offer is so small in comparison to the problems, that I struggle to give anything at all.
Which is precisely the wrong thing to do.
About two years ago I was going through a very difficult time. I had recently, rather suddenly, gone into practice for myself, and I was struggling so hard to get everything together and make it work.
I felt like I was drowning, and most days I awoke with a terrible nausea and feeling that I just wanted to sit in a corner and weep. This wasn’t how I anticipated my life turning out, and the pressure I felt was enormous.
That challenge was (and still is) pushing all of my weakness buttons, and as hard as I fought to try and make it work, I constantly felt like I was on the precipice, ready to fall at any time.
And all of my support seemed to have left me.
I’m not blaming them, I know everyone has their own lives and struggles, but sometimes just even knowing that someone cared, that someone was aware of what I was going through, would have made a huge difference.
I try to reach out to people a lot, because you never know when will be the moment that someone desperately needs that connection to remind them that somebody cares.
Just to know that someone is thinking of you can sometimes be the difference between hope and despair.
I know that, because it happened to me one morning two years ago. On my way to the office, to see a handful of patients, I received a text from a patient at the practice I had recently left. I always knew this patient was an outstanding human being, but this text was so perfect for me that it moved me to tears.
He told me that he had been thinking of me, and hoped that everything was going well, and to remind me that things were going to be bumpy, but that I had this.
The text was less than 4 lines long, but on that difficult, cold, scary morning where I felt like the world was collapsing in on me, those words meant more to me than I could ever have imagined. It helped me realize that there were people who cared, and who believed I could achieve what I was so doubtful of.
Most of all, it helped me reset my perspective that what I was doing was something hard, and that trials and falls I was experiencing was the nature of what I was doing, not a reflection on me.
A simple text, just someone reaching out, made the world seem kinder, and gave me hope.
I’m sure that the person who reached out didn’t have any idea just how much that text meant to me, he just gave support where he could, how he could, and when he could. His example to me has in turn helped others, as I have tried to reach out and help in any way that I can.
We may not be able to solve everyone’s problems, but just by giving what little we can, by doing whatever small thing we can, it’s possible that we can change the outcome of one day, and by doing, change the outcome of one life.
And each life is precious, and deserving of our help.
— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings