My Father's Admonitions Before I Left

Doctor zhou January 27, 2023

On the fourth day of the first lunar month, I left my hometown for Wuhan, planning to continue from Wuhan to Beijing the next day. My family saw me off to the high-speed rail station. On the way, my father said to me: "Don't throw your whole heart into other people's affairs. You need not exert yourself to the point of utter exhaustion for patients or for family; let each person worry about his own affairs. You yourself must conserve your strength and take care of your health."

Just before this trip, my father inadvertently said something: he said that only now, after catching COVID, could he be said to have fully recovered. Because before then he had always had some mild discomfort—for example, he easily became short of breath and fatigued after working, and sweated from time to time at night.

My father's full recovery was related to five packets of Chinese medicine I bought for him when I went home for the New Year. The first time I saw him on arriving home, I realized he was wearing too much, which showed he still had some aversion to cold. I used my own experienced formula Chai Gu Jiedu Tang and bought five packets of it for him.

This formula is my later-stage special-effect formula for elderly COVID patients, and it can relieve almost all the various symptoms that appear in most elderly people after COVID. My father had a prior history of coronary heart disease and emphysema; some sequelae after COVID were inevitable, so as soon as I arrived home I put him on this formula. By the time I left, he had finished two packets; the sequelae that had appeared before basically all disappeared.

But before I came home, my father had refused to tell me about these discomforts, because he was afraid I would worry about him and spend energy on him. Before I came home for the New Year, my father told me on the phone that he was perfectly well, only repeatedly reminding me to rest more and not overwork. A father's tender love is indeed all the deeper with age.

Over these years, my clinical workload has been heavy, and I have had to keep reviewing for the specialized-practitioner qualification exam; the medical-administration authorities in my area are particularly slow, and one exam has dragged on for nearly ten years, making us wait year after year. On top of that, I myself diligently write articles, which has truly consumed too much of my heart's blood; and the national epidemic at the end of last year left me utterly exhausted.

My father saw all of this and worried that my body could not bear it. That is why he did not want me to overwork; had he not inadvertently said one sentence, I would not have known he was hiding his true condition from me.

The people in this world who love us most are always willing to sacrifice themselves for us, while at the same time not wanting us to sacrifice too much for them. My father has never been good at expressing his feelings, but from these tiny details I can feel his paternal love.

My father also tirelessly admonished me to keep a proper distance in my dealings with people, including relatives and friends. He told me to keep a certain distance from every relative and friend, not to be too warm-hearted as to take the initiative to treat them, and that even with relatives one should follow the principle that "the physician does not knock on the door." Because patients coming to the door seeking treatment is a sign of trust; on matters of life and death, trust may not be firm even among relatives, and medical care without trust will not end well.

These admonitions are truly every word a gem, yet I keep going against the principles my father taught me, refusing to be someone who watches a patient die without lifting a hand, always thinking of doing my part to help those around me. Perhaps it is because, from antiquity to the present, medical books contain too many essays like Sun Simiao's Great Medical Sincerity; having read such essays often, those of us who study medicine are unconsciously influenced.

A person who loves medicine, on hearing or seeing someone ill (especially someone in danger of death), always has a conditioned reflex. If we have not tried our best and the patient dies, we feel guilt and regret. A high school classmate of mine died of illness a year and a half ago; I did not learn of his condition in time and did not rescue him, and for more than a year now I feel heartache and regret whenever I think of him.

These are things my father cannot understand; what he cares about most is me. To him, his own son's well-being is what matters most; he is even willing to sacrifice his own well-being to protect his son's safety. So after I returned to my rural home, when some local patients wanted to come to my house to see me, I refused them all; I told them to find me collectively in Wuhan. I could not let my father see my only few days of rest occupied like that; it would sadden him for a long time.

On the way back to Beijing, I kept turning over my father's admonitions and reflecting on my own ways of doing things. The problems my father pointed out as an onlooker must objectively exist. These sincere words could only have been spoken by someone who loves me as deeply as my father does.

Every month I give my father 2,000 yuan in pension money; he lives frugally and rarely spends it, because he never wants to become a burden to me. In previous years he always wanted to support himself through his own labor; even now he still grows some vegetables and rapeseed at home, trying to be self-sufficient in vegetables and vegetable oil. A 76-year-old man still loves his children in his own way. To my father, the more I care for my own health, the more at ease he can be.

When one reaches middle age, it is time to seek a balance and stop at the proper measure in everything.

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