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GENERATIONAL
PERSPECTIVES
feel that as a girl, she was any less capable or brilliant than a boy. ing to support a
And in 1960s India, that is saying something. She always knew she single mother, he became a social activist and
wanted to do medicine and Dadu encouraged her. Women could physician. He traveled all he could and gave back even more, did
do anything a man could do, she was told. And so she excelled. disaster relief with Mother Teresa herself in response to a mudslide.
My dad was the first to tell me about Doctors without Borders and
Some people get their MDs — my overachieving parents got their I’ve always thought he could easily fit that title himself.
MDs, then their PhDs. Women in India did pediatrics or OB —
my mom did anesthesia all the way in America, to boot. She and These are the doctors who came before me and shaped who I am
my father took the FMGEMS, the entrance exam foreign medical today. They taught me resilience even though I myself never had to
graduates had to take in the 1980s, a test that was significantly more be an immigrant or live an impoverished life. They taught me hu-
difficult than the exam Americans took: and she and my dad passed mility. They taught me to reach for the stars and not compromise
with flying colors. In India, she couldn’t and didn’t rely on tests to who I am. They taught me to care about people’s health — their
diagnose patients — she used her history and physical. And al- whole health — where they come from, the barriers they face, the
though she was not in primary care, she still brings humanity to her struggles they’ve had to overcome to be in clinic or defy a disease. If
work every single day. A few years ago, she had a 16-year-old patient I fancy myself a trailblazer, it’s only because my grandfather and par-
about to donate bone marrow to his sick brother. But her patient ents carved the trail out to begin with.
was petrified and no amount of emotional blackmail from his family
could persuade him to change his clothes and prepare for anesthesia. In four short months, I will stand on a stage, sit through speeches
But my mom got through to him. Maybe it was experience, maybe (attentively), and become a physician. I am completely excited to
she saw me or my sisters in the patient, whatever the case: she be going into internal medicine, ready to help and heal people of
brought humanity to the situation and the procedure was a success. all backgrounds. But I am also scared. I am scared of the long hours,
I am scared of the emotion and stress that comes with internship
While my Dadu taught be about social medicine, my mother has and losing your patients. A year and a half ago, I lost my Dadu to
taught me about resilience and how to be a leader. She traveled thou- prostate cancer. It was prolonged and painful in spite of our family’s
sands of miles from the people she loved to practice medicine in a best efforts, in spite of my mom flying back and forth to India and
brave new (cold) Midwestern world. She traded West Bengali for tending to him. Before that, Dadu was the healthiest, most energetic
unfamiliar Toledo, Ohio, and then El Paso, Texas. She and my dad, 80-plus-year-old I’ve ever known. It is never easy seeing someone
also an anesthesiologist, have seen children die on the operating fall so precipitately.
table, encountered racism from patients, uprooted their comfortable
lives in India to make a new life and family for me and my two sis- I know though, that scared as I may be, in spite of the challenges
ters. And through it all she has served as the chair of an anesthesia behind and before me, I am still my family’s child: motivated, so-
department, a residency program director, and a kickass full-time cial-activist-y, humanitarian-advocating, detailed, resilient child of
mom and full-time physician. immigrants ready to spot borders and cross them.
I can’t neglect to mention my father though. My dad is the defi- Shaoli Chadhuri is a fourth-year medical student at UT Health in
nition of a go-getter. From a poor community in Kolkata and help- San Antonio.
visit us at www.bcms.org 15
