The many shades of grey...

...is the colours that I am seeing each time I step out of the house in the morning! Water, water everywhere! It hasn't flooded big time in Kelantan for quite sometime and I know the kids are excited. Who would've thought the sight of a collection of water can get people mesmerised for hours.....(come to Kelantan during the monsoon season and you will know what I mean. People actually set up makeshift stalls selling kacang rebus and what nots by the bridge to cater for the mass of people who have come to see the rising level of water!)

Anyway, FIL is warded at the moment. He's been having fever last week and then developed diarrhoea. It didn't help that I was also ill (I do not recommend doing your on call with a high grade fever and runny nose, no sir ree...) and was bed ridden post call.

At the risk of people who know me reading this (be it family or colleagues), I really am not keen having this situation in my hands.

First, how do you handle relatives who think you are the big shot (on the contrary, I am just a minion) doctor who is all mighty and powerful, thus can do anything, even admitting half the kampung wayyyyy before visiting hours? I was just walking to the casualty from the canteen when I turned around and spotted a familiar face. In a split second, one familiar face became 5 familiar faces. Before I knew it, about 10 people from my FIL's kampung was trailing behind me on their way to see him. It was about half hour before visiting time and one pakcik (who's not even on good terms with my FIL's family, okay) had the nerve to pipe up, 'Ala, ada doktor kan, mesti boleh masuk punya'....hello? I tak kenal pun you sape...I punya la malu kat pakcik jaga, the moment they knew where FIL's bed is, I quickly turned around and sped off.

Sigh.

Secondly, how do you separate the doctor-you and the daughter-in-law-you? What do you do when you hear not-so-nice things about your colleagues? Is it right for you to interfere with the management of his case? Do you let it be known that the patient is your 'waris' or do you prefer if he was treated like the others? Is it fair that he gets special treatment just because his son married a doctor who happened to work at that hospital? Do you interfere with every single step of his care (tut-tutting about how the sheets have not been changed, or why the IVD isn't running or whether tepid sponging has been done) or do you stand silently at the peripheries and let your staff do their work as they have always done and you would not have bothered if this was just any other patient?

Pening tau. and it's definitely not the effects of my bout of flu.