Thursday, July 16, 2009

Careful What You Pray For

My last post was on The Sandbox blog on the Fourth of July. To read it go to http://gocomics.typepad.com/the_sandbox/2009/07/fourth-of-july.html#comments.

Like the title says careful what you pray for. Our young patient did die, I prayed he would, he needed to, so badly decimated was his body. However even knowing it's the best thing and praying it would happen do not make it any less sad. It was agonizing on the family and damn painful for those of us staff who took part in his last days. Now in the same room he occupied lies another war wounded. Shot in the head by a sniper his brain is destroyed. Destroyed beyond repair. The family is unwilling to accept it and so as before we wait. We partake in the death watch. We wait and watch for the day when the family begins to grieve a loss that started in war ravaged countries.

More are coming. The medevacs bring them in now three times a week. It's becoming routine and it sucks.

2 comments:

Don said...

As I read your words, my mind drifts off to the words of another person who, in another war, "Took the scraps that once were men, and sped them through that zone of hate, to where the dripping surgeons wait."

Rhymes of a Red Cross Man by Robert Service
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/315/315-h/315-h.htm

Flag Gazer said...

I read your original post and this one - thank you for sharing this - and thank you for all you do for so many of our finest. Your care is a blessing.