This piece is a reflection of my journey in life, from the moment my little sister was born, to my future aspirations in healthcare and writing.

What is life and death? I recall my first-ever memory, in pure detail, when my little sister was born. At four years old, I welcomed who would become one of the most important people in my life. I watched my baby sister in her little bassinet at the hospital, all wrapped in blankets and sleeping in peace. I remember holding her tiny hand as I declared that I would love her “Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday!” She was a new life to the world, and the most precious life to me. 

For most of my life, my family and I lived in a one-bedroom apartment that offered little personal space. But whatever free space we had, my sisters and I filled it with books. The public library across the street had been my second home for as long as I could remember, and I would visit every few days to return and pick up a new stack of reading material. I reached for books about new species, diseases I’ve never known before, and anything that expanded the world I thought I knew so well. Curiosity was a foundation of my life fueled by reading and writing. 

Growing up, I would often reflect on the lives of those whom I admired the most. There was Stephen Hawking, who fundamentally changed how we understand the universe. There was also Neil deGrasse Tyson, Albert Einstein, Martin Luther King Jr., and above all, my elementary school teachers. These are the people who have engaged my curiosity, who have shaped my reality. I thought about how every single person in this universe has directly or indirectly been a meaningful part of someone else’s existence. 

The summer after fifth grade, my parents brought me to Bangladesh, their home country, to spend our vacation. Although I had been to Bangladesh one time prior, it was only this year when I really began to notice my surroundings. My mother’s family lived in a very rural section of the country, so driving from the airport to my mother’s childhood home was a journey I would never forget. Bangladesh is considered an overpopulated, impoverished country. But those words are never as significant as experiencing firsthand how it really is. 

During a particularly long traffic jam, I noticed an older man, who had a particularly gruesome eye injury, and had been carrying a sign while knocking from car door to car door, begging for money. When he approached our car, my uncle quickly told us to ignore him; he said that this was simply the way of life for many people there. My mother refused, and gave the older man some money. As a child, that was the first time I recognized just how important money is, and how it is even more important for individuals to be able to access healthcare. 

My first experience with loss was also in Bangladesh. We arrived at my aunt’s house, where she introduced me to my uncle. My uncle was bedridden, with closed eyes and sunken cheeks. He was unresponsive, but my aunt confirmed that he does sometimes twitch his fingers or eyes as a reply. My aunt told me that he has been bedridden for years, suffering from an illness that the healthcare system in Bangladesh simply could not sufficiently treat. He died some years later. 

In a world where gender discrimination dictated people’s lives, I also met one of the most hardworking, admirable people I will ever know: my grandmother. She was the mother of nine children, and worked herself to the bone, taking care of a large family while her husband handled his responsibilities. And when she grew ill, when her memories slowly began to fade, when she no longer had control of her bowels and had broken her hip, there was nothing that could be done. Since healthcare in Bangladesh is already lacking, my grandmother could never receive the right treatment, despite all the money her children could offer, to live the rest of her life painlessly. 

During the end of high school, I received a call in the middle of the night. My grandmother had died. That was when I resolved to work in healthcare. I was going to study medicine in college, and work to make proper healthcare more accessible for people. 

Now I work as a Medical Scribe in the Emergency Department. My primary role entails documenting the stories of the patients, from their chief complaint, to their diagnosis and treatment plan. My intention is to grow and keep learning new parts of healthcare that I’ve never known before, and use my writing to record important cases and ultimately, support the advancement of healthcare in modern society. This is in the hopes that more and more lives can be saved in every part of the world. 

Life is such a valuable gift, and death is devastating. If I could spend the rest of my life making sure people are able to live their lives, impacting other people’s lives along the way, that makes my life well lived.

Process

When I first sat down to write this piece, I had no idea what I wanted to write about. All I knew was that I wanted the piece to showcase an authentic version of myself. Both writing and healthcare are really meaningful to me, and I decided to write about the interconnectedness of these parts in my life.