Horrible new year
Horrible new year. This is a devastating way for me to welcome a new year.
When I was still a medical student, I knew medicine was difficult, but I never imagined it could be this brutal.
l am in severe neuropathic pain, my back, my legs, and everything else in my chaotic life is crushing what remains of my peace. I took simple painkillers; they did nothing. I went to the pharmacy and asked for something stronger, only to be told that what I need is restricted, limited.
That moment broke something inside me. I was instantly taken back to all the patients I have seen forced to beg for pain relief, people in agony, denied even the most basic dignity.
Feeling that same helplessness myself was heartbreaking. The pain was no longer only physical; it cut straight into my dignity. To beg for anything, especially painkillers, is a humiliation no human being should ever endure.
And I frankly don't even want painkillers anymore. I don't want temporary relief. I keep myself busy with the pain so I don't look away from everyone's suffering, so I don't forget the profound darkness and inhumanity I am living through.
Today's shift was beyond exhaustion, physically, mentally, emotionally. At some point after the new year had begun, moments after I decided I would stop trying to silence my pain, I had a brief moment to sit and breathe. I did nothing. I thought nothing. l just waited for peace to arrive. I have been doing this since I was born.
It never did, before, now, or in my lifetime. I never imagined the genocide would last into 2024. They said it would stop, because what was happening could not possibly continue while the world welcomed a new year, while we had already been massacred for two months.
The neW year came, then another, and then another. The world kept moving, abandoning us to more massacres and more butchers.
Every new year arrived with me still waiting for peace, still trapped in devastation, and filled with anger toward everyone and everything that did not try hard enough to stop this.
The year changed, four times. Nothing else did. The years will continue to change. Nothing else will.
