Mom & Me Four Archive

...the Star Trek episode Who Mourns for Adonais? It was one of the more memorable episodes of The Original Series, even though it may not have been considered one of the best. Although I've seen it twice, once when it originally aired and once soon after I came to be my mother's companion and she was hooked on everything Star Trek, I confess I didn't remember much of the story prior to reading the synopsis linked to the episode title above. What I did remember is that it was a literal interpretation of how and why gods die: By being rejected by their believers. I also remembered that the last and greatest of the Olympian gods, Apollo, spent the episode fighting for his life, his existence as a god. Not surprisingly, it aired a little over a year after Time Magazine wondered aloud, Is God Dead?. As I've been reading the comments left at the hospital directive post that this week's Grand Rounds edition published, I've been reminded of this episode. The passion with which commenters have reacted to the post has caused me to consider the similarity of the medical industrial complex to Mount Olympus and medical professionals to Apollo. This isn't a new idea. I've occasionally nodded, without originality, in these journals, toward recognition that physicians used to be considered gods, nurses considered angels and healing used to be considered sacred ground. This has been acknowledged for at least a couple of decades in this country as Medicine has found itself under heavy pressure to change. While the healing arts can, at this time, promise and deliver an astounding array of cures and managements, more than ever before, it is also becoming increasingly hard to avail oneself of these developments, or to be sure that, when one can afford the services of professional healers, the healing provided is thorough and appropriate. It's as though Medicine is losing its believers and fighting its demotion from Sacred to Profane. Thus, Medicine has become the nucleus around which swirls passionate contention. At this point in time it should probably be added to the famous list of subjects one should avoid in polite company if one doesn't want to promote a ruckus: Politics, Religion and, now, Medicine.
    This is why I haven't been upset by the comments, even as some of them are beginning to sound like trolling, as one commenter pointed out. As I mentioned to a correspondent today, "I notice...that I've received the best negative comments yet, the last two. What a hot button my post has pushed! I'm pleased, actually. If none of the readers of the post was commenting, or if all the comments where of the "here, here" variety, that would tell me that this is an issue about which no one was prepared to think (I've noticed that people first have to spew about hot button issues before they can think about them but, after the spewing, they always start thinking) and Medicine is not yet about to budge."
    It's been suggested, by more than one reader, that I should consider disallowing "Anonymous" access to commenting, partly to prevent trolling and partly to modulate the discussion. I can't bring myself to do this. I truly believe, as was pointed out in The American President, that burning the flag should be protected as a form of free speech. So should trolling, if that's in what some commenters are indulging, no matter how offensive it becomes. The time is not right for moderation and sanity in any discussion about Medicine, what it has been to us, what it is now, what we want it to become and how we should go about changing the Medical Landscape.
    As well, I can only find the pejoratives flung at me such as "monster" and "mother killer" amusing. I can't remember ever being demonized and it's, well, entertaining to be accorded such power, especially since I don't possess it. I've been my mother's caregiver, both in and out of the medical field, far too long and have performed too well in this capacity for me to be intimidated by such epithets. Besides, behind this spew is the real demon, a paralyzing terror that we must face and with which we must deal before we can calmly proceed to figuring out how to provide all of Healing's miracles to everyone. What I hear is, "If we challenge Medicine, aren't we also challenging Health and Life?" Well, no, but we don't know this, now. Not at a gut level. I trust we will, but we're not there, yet.
    Anyway, this is the last of my pronouncements about the stir I've caused with "that post": Let's yell, scream, throw those thunderbolts, get it out of our systems, out into the open. Then we can begin to deal with the problems from a level perspective and, maybe, in doing so, level the delivery field. After all, when a god is rejected, the ideas that created the god remain and become available to all the subjects. This is the point at which innovation begins. When we reach this point, we'll be past mourning.
    In the meantime, my mother's calling me.
    Later.