OUCH MOMENTS

 Do you ever get random memories that make you cringe or blush especially when you have not remembered those things in a long time? My brain likes to take me on random trips down remembrance lane from time to time to keep me humble or should I say it likes to remind me that I am only mortal and so I am prevented from developing airs.

Yesterday was one of such days. I suddenly remembered something that happened 10 years ago and of course that led me on a convoluted journey into the underworld of cringe worthy moments. My aim in sharing these moments is to spread some of the joy of being human and if I can tease a laugh from you then I'd say my day is complete.

So what did I remember? An episode that started with my sister calling me frantically about her child who was ill. She has the benefit of a personal physician- me. My default mode when I think it is not a matter to be settled on the phone is to refer her to the nearest hospital I trust. Several years ago, after my youth service, I worked in a hospital in Lagos so this was my first choice. I therefore directed her to seek the services of the physician there who I knew. After she had seen him, I sent him a text from obodo oyinbo to thank him for helping my sister. And he replied.

A lesson I learned from my dad was to always keep in touch with people and not just remember them whenever you needed something from them. So I decided that I would randomly send a text to this particular physician sometime after because I knew that I would be referring people to that particular clinic and did not want to call only when I needed his help. So like a child who diligently applies the lessons learned from proper home training, I sent off a general text just to say hello or so I thought. The response to my text message was one which made me wonder at the inner workings of the human mind. 

Me: Hello Dr. Y, thank you for helping my sister. I just wanted to say hello. I hope work is going on great. 

Dr. Y: Dr L, I am engaged to be married and in a very happy relationship.

Me: Mouth open reading the screen for about 1 minute and a feeling of utter embarrassment that anyone would think I was looking for a relationship or a husband by the text I had just sent.

I can look back at that interaction now and laugh but it taught me a valuable lesson that what you perceive as innocuous, others might interpret as being a double innuendo. You can be sure that I suspended that part of my home training and applied it only to the members of the fairer sex going forward. It is one of the hazards of being a single female in a world that expects you to be married right out of college. I have stories about this part of my life in full measure but I do not want to bore you.

Another cringe worthy moment had to do with my job. I had a patient who was very ill and consulted another physician about what I had wrongly interpreted as a life threatening condition. I got feedback that I had wrongly interpreted the signs. I was mortified because I felt that I should have known better. Of course, my ego took a punch but as my good friends pointed out, it is better to err on the side of caution than to find out after the fact that the patient in fact had a life threatening condition that was wrongly interpreted as benign. Working in a predominantly alpha male packed field with perceived 'jostling' for the glories of being the best diagnostician can be intimidating but the lesson I have learned in this instance, is that I can sit down and study things that I do not know or find difficult and improve my diagnostic skills and that one or more ouch moments do not define me no matter what anyone thinks.

I decided to share my ouch moments because I have learned when others share their own ouch moments and I have learned how others handle difficult situations or how they defused a situation that had the potential to be explosive. It also helps the people who might look up to you for inspiration to know that it is okay to make mistakes and that it doesn't diminish you in anyway. 

So looking back at my first ouch story, one lesson it taught me is to be gracious. If I was not so shocked at Dr. Y's response so many years ago, my first inclination to his text message would have been to compose a scathing text message that would have sent his phone up in flames the minute he read it.  Now I think if I received his text, I would have chuckled and shared with my friends his ridiculous response and have ourselves a good belly laugh. The older I get, the more gracious I have become.

So what ouch moments would you like to share today and what lessons have you learned from them?

*Obodo Oyinbo- a foreign country