by Ellie Rowe
Anyways, I make my way to the scrub room, accepting defeat in my search for the scrub cap. It’s fifteen minutes til the surgery starts and my patient is already being prepped. I walk in to start scrubbing to see that Oliver is already doing the same.
Oliver is the other cardiothoracic surgeon in the hospital. He transferred to San Diego from some small practice he worked for in Nevada. I tried to be his friend when he first arrived- but unfortunately, he came in guns blazing, like he was trying to mark his territory or something.
We’ve pretty much been enemies ever since, and I try to avoid working with him as much as possible. As I approach the sinks, I remember exactly why. Because Oliver is standing next to me… wearing my lucky scrub cap.
I know he did this on purpose to try to get a rise out of me- he feeds off of that kind of thing. He feeds off of your insecurities and the things he knows tic you off. And I hate him for that.
I honestly don’t think I’ve ever met a cockier surgeon than him. I mean, most of us are cocky- you kind of have to be to survive as a surgeon- but he takes it to a whole new level.
Fighting the urge to punch him, I turn in his direction. But before I can even say anything, he’s through the doors and into the sterile field. Once I’m finished scrubbing, I make a promise to myself that I won’t let him get to me during this seven-hour surgery, and then I enter the OR. Oliver has already begun opening her up- of course.
This surgery means a lot to me because the woman on the table has been a patient of mine since my second year of residency. We see her a few times a year, and she’s had tons of surgeries. She’s a twenty-five-year-old first grade teacher. I can’t help but have a bit of a soft spot for her. Who wouldn’t?
Not only that, but she’s the Chief of Surgery’s stepdaughter. Hence, why he is up in the gallery watching. As if the surgery itself isn’t enough pressure.
The surgery begins, and things go as planned for the first three hours. And then all of a sudden, our patient begins bleeding much more than she should be. My heart rate speeds up and I’m terrified. I can’t lose this patient.
“Did you nick something? I don’t understand.”
“No, I didn’t nick something, I’m not an amateur.”
“Even experienced surgeons can nick things sometimes, Oliver.”
“Not me. Never.”
“Someone run down and get more O neg, now! Hurry!” I shout.
“Got it!!” someone yells, leaving the OR.
“I say we try to get in there and see what’s going on.”
“Well I say that we don’t know where the bleeder is, and we can’t just go in blindly and possibly make it worse. Suction, please.”
“We can’t wait any longer. We need to make a decision now. By the time the blood gets here she won’t even be alive to receive it.”
“I’ve seen bleeders like this before. They start off bad, like a big gush of blood, but then it clears up. We just have to wait for it to do its thing and meanwhile, more suction please.”
“She’ll be dead by then; don’t you get it??”
“Well your idea isn’t any better, okay?”
I glance up at the gallery, where the Chief is on the edge of his seat, panic written all over his face. We really don’t have that much time.
“Better than doing nothing.”
Just as I’m about to open my mouth to respond, someone interrupts me.
“Enough,” a female voice interrupts from my left.
“You two are not going to come to an agreement by screaming at each other, and this patient doesn’t have the time for that. Just focus on the patient. Shut your eyes and think. Then, go from there.”
The OR goes silent. Who the hell was that, and who does she think she is, interrupting us like that? I turn to my left to look at who it is, only to see that it’s Ashley, the best scrub nurse on the floor.
Looks like Ashley might be getting a little too cozy here. Everyone knows better than to interrupt the surgeons unless medically necessary.
Although I have to admit- the girl is kind of right. Arguing back and forth will do nothing. We need a solution. So I suck it up and close my eyes.
Fifty-Three
Oliver
Fuck this day. It just keeps getting worse and worse. Having to be co-surgeons with James equals an automatic bad day, no matter what. That’s just how it is.
See, I’m sure James has his own made-up reasons for why he’s a dick to me. But none of his excuses are anything real.
The truth is that when I first transferred here, James immediately started hazing me. Like he had this preconceived notion that I wasn’t good at my job because I went to work at a small practice after residency instead of some big hotshot hospital.
He kept treating me like I was some intern that kept fucking everything up. For a long time, he wouldn’t let me have any surgeries. Which is why now, I make sure that I get to them first. I refuse to be treated less than- not when I graduated top of my class at Johns Hopkins, was the top intern my intern year, chief resident, and was offered all the best fellowships.
Then there’s this dude over here who’s never even left the hospital he started at, like he’s scared that he won’t be good anywhere else. You ask me, the guy is overrated. Because of him, it took a year for the nurses and other staff members to trust me. He led them to believe that I was some crap surgeon who barely passed medical school.
It’s embarrassing, and certainly not at all what I thought my experience at this hospital would be. I give myself one more year of putting up with this shit, and then I’m gonna have to find somewhere else- somewhere I feel welcome and appreciated.
It’s been two years now- the hazing should be done by now. I don’t need a friend; I need my fellow cardiothoracic surgeon to trust me so that I can trust him back. In the OR, trust is everything. Something James clearly hasn’t learned yet. Or maybe he just doesn’t care. I’m not sure which is worse.
At this point, there’s really nothing I can do. I’ve accepted that he’s just a dick who treats people like shit because of his own insecurities. In fact, I think the real reason he felt the need to haze me in the first place was because he was intimidated by how good I actually am. So I’ve chosen to just ignore him and do my job.
I usually do pretty good with ignoring him, but today? Today I’m done. It’s one thing to disagree with me out of the OR, or even in the OR- but when a patient is really and truly at risk and you just want to argue because you can’t accept that someone else might be right and you might be wrong? That’s just childish, and it makes you a shitty doctor.
And now, he’s driven a scrub nurse to jump in and interrupt us, which makes me livid. I mean, who does she think she is? I would be angrier with her, but there really isn’t time for that right now. See, I know how to put the patient first- no matter what’s going on in my life. So, I do as she says.
I close my eyes and take a couple of deep breaths. I go over everything that has happened very carefully in my head. Step by step, every move both of us has made. Replaying the moment just before the bleeder appeared over and over again.
I go through all of our options, trying to decide what will get us to our goal as quick as possible. If he’s right, and the bleeding will resolve itself- then I’ll look stupid. If he’s not right, and we wait- our patient will be dead in minutes.
I open my eyes seemingly at the same time as James. We look each other and nod. It’s now or never.
“Follow me carefully and closely with the suction. I’m going to retrace my steps, find the bleeder, and carefully patch it up. Should hold until the blood gets here, and then we can find a more permanent solution.”
We work quickly and effectively, without saying another word. I’m able to find the bleeder quicker than I thought I would. It wasn’t anything big, but I threw a quick patch on it just before the blood arrived, and we were able to stitch it back up and then continue with the surgery.
Another few hours later, and we�
�re finally done. No more complications occurred, and the surgery ended up a success. The patient moves to post-op, and we move to the scrub room.
As I’m scrubbing out, I remember the nurse. Looking over, I see that she’s at the scrub sink by door, finishing up. I look at James, who seems to have the same idea that I do.
See, even though she was right, and we did need to just close our eyes and think- we’re the surgeons. It was none of her business to butt in. Especially in a surgery that the Chief was watching every second of. She embarrassed both of us in front of him and everyone else in the OR and gallery.
I know that Ashley is one of the best scrub nurses in the cardio wing. She always knows what you want before you even ask for it. She’s quick, and she doesn’t ask a lot of questions. Ashley knows what she’s doing. But that doesn’t mean she gets to talk to the lead surgeons however she wants to, in front of everyone.
“Ahem.” I speak up.
Ashley is about to walk out the door.
“Ashley, can we have a word?”
She freezes and then slowly turns around to face us, a look of terror in her eyes. Is she really so ignorant that she thought she would just get away with this?
It’s weird being on the same side of something with James. We never agree on anything. But she embarrassed both of us, so I guess we’re on the same team now.
A small part of me wants to defend her against whatever he says, just to make him mad. But I guess I’ve already been spiteful enough today. After all, I did steal his lucky scrub cap out of the attendings lounge last night so that he couldn’t wear it today.
Why did I do that? Well, quite frankly- I think it’s stupid. A fucking scrub cap doesn’t change the outcome of your surgery. Skill, precision, and expertise, yes- those are definitely required. But a special scrub cap? That’s just childish to me.
I guess I wanted to show him that, although he didn’t even say anything about it. I guess he either didn’t notice, or I was wrong, and he just didn’t care.
I’m about to open my mouth to speak when James beats me to it. As always.
Fifty-Four
Ashley
I’m feeling triumphant. Like how I would imagine Olympic athletes feel when they receive a gold medal. Okay maybe not that good, but pretty damn close. Today I was able to get two idiot surgeons to quit acting like children and actually focus on the medicine, and not on trying to best each other.
I’ve always wanted to work in the medical field, ever since I was seven years old and my father died of cancer. I told myself I wanted to be the one helping people that are sick and dying. And I did just that.
I graduated from high school a year early, so that I could get a head start on my career. I even graduated from college early as well, top of my class. Became a scrub nurse while most of my friends were still in their first year of college. And then my mom died.
I was twenty-one years old, and she was my best friend. She died of the same cancer that my dad had- how coincidental is that? I was broken, but I was in the middle of my first year as a scrub nurse, and I couldn’t take any time off. I had to just work through it.
That’s how I became the best damn scrub nurse in the hospital. It was the only thing I could do to save myself from the grief. I worked my ass off, and basically never left the hospital. I have so many surgeries memorized that I barely have to think about which instruments to hand the surgeons anymore.
More than anything, I wish my mom and dad were here to see how great I’ve done for myself. They were my only family. We didn’t have anyone else growing up because both sets of my grandparents were extremely religious and basically shunned my parents when they had me out of wedlock.
So work is all I’ve got- seriously, I don’t even date. I’m convinced that it’ll always be this way, and I’m pretty okay with that.
I’m feeling pretty good as I’m scrubbing out, and I’m about to turn and leave the scrub room, when the two surgeons I interrupted earlier stop me.
I turn around to face them, preparing to show no fear- but seeing their faces without masks proves to be a lot more intimidating than I thought. Not to mention how angry they both look with me.
Dr. McKinnon speaks up first.
“In case you didn’t know, rule number one in an OR as a scrub nurse is to not embarrass the surgeons. You’re supposed to keep to yourself and do what you’re being paid to do. Did you forget this, or were you just blatantly trying to be disrespectful?”
Yeah, that’s it. Just because these guys are in a higher position than I am, doesn’t mean that they can say whatever they want to me. It doesn’t mean they’re better than me.
“Embarrass you? You guys were already doing that yourselves. And in case you didn’t know, rule number one in an OR as a surgeon is to put the patient first. You two better get it together before you kill someone.”
And with that, I walk out before they can even say a word. I keep walking all the way to the nurse’s locker room. Ripping off my scrubs, I change into my non work clothes, and grab my things. I couldn’t be happier that that was my last surgery of the day.
Usually, I stick around to help with the post-operative care, but today I just can’t. I need to go home. What started off as a really good day was turned into anything but, by those assholes.
Everyone knows about the rivalry between Dr. James McKinnon and Dr. Oliver Walsh. People actually take bets on which one will crack and throw the first punch. They think it’s funny and amusing.
I don’t think it’s either of those things. I think it’s childish, and idiotic. These are two grown men, and they act like they’re competing for who should be the captain of the fucking football team. It’s ridiculous, and someone needs to whip them into shape. Maybe that someone needs to be me.
From work, I drive to El Cajon, to the cemetery where my mother and father are buried. I like to visit them whenever I have a bad day. Trust me, I know that sounds morbid, but it actually helps a lot.
I like to tell them about my day and talk about what’s bothering me, and when I leave, I usually end up having some sort of solution to my problems.
By the time I get there, the sun is setting. I sit in between their graves, which are right next to each other.
“Hi Mom, hi Dad. I’ve been missing you guys a lot lately. I know, I know- I say that every time I come to see you guys, but I can’t help but miss you all the time.”
“Work has been really good. I’m one of the best scrub nurses they have. All the surgeons request to have me in their surgeries- even ones that aren’t on the cardio floor. This means I basically have first pick, so I can switch it up if I want to. I can’t tell you guys how much I love my job. It’s so rewarding. I just wish you guys were here to see me thrive at it.”
“I know, I know- you’re probably wondering what brought me here today if everything is so perfect. The thing is, there are these two cardio surgeons who just can’t get along to save their lives. They hate each other so much, that it’s starting to really affect their work and their patient care. They focus so much on their hate for each other that they forget why they’re really there.”
“And today- well, today I just couldn’t take it anymore. I just had to say something to them. And I’m afraid that when I go back to work tomorrow, there might be real consequences waiting there for me.”
“I know what you’re thinking- that I’ve always had a big mouth. And you’d be right to say that. But this time, it wasn’t about me. I said the things I said so that maybe those idiots will actually hear me and change the way they’ve been acting. Because if this goes on any longer, I might have to switch to the neuro floor or something. I don’t want to ever be in a place where I dread going to work every day, because work is all I have.”
“And mom, I know you’re probably saying that I should go out and get some friends so that I don’t only have work. But it’s not that I don’t have friends. I just don’t have anyone or anything in my life that makes me feel as good as
my job does. And so I put my everything into it. I have to.”
By the time I leave, instead of having a solution- I’m feeling even more confused and stressed than I was when I arrived. At home, I don’t even try to eat or anything. I just jump in the shower and then pass out in bed. This day was way too exhausting.
Fifty-Five
James
What the fuck was that? She can’t be fucking serious.
I wish that she wasn’t, but her tone was that of someone who means business, so I just keep my head down and continue scrubbing. The nerve of some of the O.R. nurses has always been something that rubs me the wrong way, but this is on a whole new level.
Who did this girl think she was, telling me how to run my O.R.? It’s bad enough that things started going south in the first place, but to have a nurse cut me off mid surgery- in front of everyone in the gallery, mind you- was something that I wouldn’t soon forget, especially with how important the surgery was.
“Can you believe the nerve of that one?”
Oliver. I sort of forgot that he was there, and his words shake me out of my daze. He’s rubbing his hands dry with a towel and talking fast, like he can’t decide whether to be sad or angry or both.
“I mean c’mon, James. That was bullshit and you know it. Tension gets high in a surgery like that, and sometimes arguments happen. She can’t be stepping in and making fools of us whenever she sees fit.”
I want to agree with Oliver because if I’m being honest, I know he’s partially right. When it comes to surgeries like that, tensions do get high. But truthfully, no one would’ve had to step in if we would’ve kept our emotions in check.
As much as I hate to admit it, my feelings of anger aren’t just directed at Ashley. More than anything, I’m angry at myself, and I tell Oliver so.
