While the country has been through so much this past year, has anyone thought about the health-care workers? How do they feel about carrying out their duties with utmost passion and dedication, even at the risk of their own lives?
The University of the Philippines, in partnership with UP Manila NIH National Telehealth Center and UP Philippine General Hospital (UP-PGH), organized a special edition webinar that tackled “Covid-19 Frontliners: Kumusta na Kayo?”
Dr. Anselmo Tronco, Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the UP-PGH, shared how frontliners can seek and continue to find meaning in serving the patients despite the adverse conditions they face.
What everybody has been going through so far, says Dr. Tronco, could be captured in one or two words—suffering and pain. “I thought that a year and one month after the pandemic, it is important to talk about how to find meaning in our suffering, in our remaining uncertainty and fear.”
Life’s meaning
Dr. Tronco proceeded by asking, “What is your life’s meaning at the moment in your present situation as a caregiver, in your personal circumstance, and in relation to the present uncertainty and reality of our lives?” He said that finding meaning is a personal journey, where “we need to pause, to linger, and in the end, pray more to hopefully find the answer as we move through the uncertain future of the finish line.”
He cited the experience of Dr. Victor Frankl, a doctor, neurologist and psychiatrist who survived the Auschwitz concentration camp in World War II. Despite that gripping experience of the uncontrollable suffering and fear of dying, he lived to tell his story, his experience, “I thought it might be fitting, because right now, many of us feel that this is testing beyond our limits, because we’re still far from the finish line.”
Dr. Tronco pointed to Dr. Frankl, who said that one remains optimistic despite the tragic triumph, one finds life’s potential meaning in spite of its tragic aspects, even in the most miserable of times. “Tragic optimism includes turning pain into human achievement and accomplishment.”
But how does one find meaning? Dr. Tronco said that in the end, it is the attitude where we take over unavoidable circumstances that helps us find meaning. As Dr. Frankl recounted in his book, The Search for Meaning, Dr. Tronco noted that Frankl recalled a time where he saw that people in the concentration camp were hungry but still managed to share bread with their best friend or anyone who they felt was in greater need.
“As they were herded from one camp to the other, along the way, some of them looked out the window to view the beautiful scenery as they moved between camps. Perhaps, despite our miserable state now, what will emerge of it will be kindness, self-compassion, kindness for others and simply put, loving one another,” He said.
Adversity and suffering
Dr. Tronco also shared stories of people who were seriously ill but found meaning in adversity and suffering in the pandemic. Most of them, he said, discovered renewed spirituality in the face of serious Covid-19 infection that it was really their faith and how they surrendered to God that made them survive. One doctor said he realized that fame, money, accomplishments, being good in one’s field do not really matter. What really matters is one’s unceasing faith in God, and that one has to surrender to Him.
He also related the story of a surgeon who suffered a stroke that paralyzed his left hand. The moment a surgeon loses the strength of one of his hands, it becomes a very tragic event. The surgeon did all that he could to recover and to bring back his capacity as a surgeon, but his most touching story was when he brought his very young daughter to the park.
She played at the monkey bar and then fell, but he was able to catch his daughter with his left hand. Dr. Tronco said that contrary to the surgeon’s belief that the meaning of his life is about being a surgeon who had trained abroad, and spent a lot of time treating patients, he realized that the meaning of his life is changing. “He would want to be a good surgeon but primarily, he wants to be a father who is around to catch his children before they fall.”
Dr. Tronco said they have been getting people to share their stories as they work in the Covid ward. “We realized that people have to witness the experience of our front liners. By witnessing their difficulty, hopefully, it will alleviate their pain and they will not feel alone because people are also experiencing a range of human emotions, anger, fear, anxiety, and then you listen to another, sharing the same story. It is a very important event when you feel that you are in this together.”
Life meaning
He also related the story of a female resident in internal medicine who found meaning in serving in the Covid ward, of taking care of Covid patients despite the fear of getting it. The resident gave a refreshing point of view as she finds a sense of pride in the fact that someday, she can tell her grandchildren that she worked at the front lines of a global pandemic.
Dr. Tronco brought up a second question: “What is your own meaning of life?” “Probably the most overarching meaning now is to be more intentional in kindness, and compassion to self and others.”
Being a social psychiatrist he saw the strength of the Filipino can be in terms of culture. “We are a relational people rather than individualistic compared to the West. We want to listen and engage in an emotional way to the person next to us. Because of our relational nature, we actually share our personal narratives with one another as we realize that we are not alone in the face of Covid-19, that we’re able to cope, that we’re able to provide solutions and finally, we find meaning in this experience.”
Also, it is with prayer and the Filipinos’ reservoir of faith from which their resilience emanates. “Most of us have a sense of prayer and spirituality, and that is a very important context, when we actually pause, reflect, sit down in prayer.”