conversations about medicine and life

“Grandma”: a story

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Georgia MacKenzie

Spending time with her grandkids was one of Barbara’s favourite activities. And so her heart swelled with love, as she glanced in her rear view mirror, to see four pairs of eyes and four small faces grinning back at her.

“All belted up?”

“Yes!”

They sat two-by-two, with the two youngest in the front tier and the two eldest at the back. Two sets of fairy wings. One tutu. One pirate sword.

They pulled out of the driveway and off into the streets, zipping through the lines of traffic, off swiftly to their destination. Off to try another café.

Grandma might not have been the most athletic, or the most agile, but she definitely came close to being the most wise. Her house was filled floor to ceiling with piles upon piles of books. And oh how she loved those books. Filled with adventures and romance and the collective wisdom of so many authors. Wisps of spiderweb blurred the line between book and floor. But if you dared to move one, she would know.

“There’s a system. Don’t mess with the system.”

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“I’m on my way, Nan”: a story

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Drew Davey

Ngaia has come home.

“Nan first,” she says. “I’m on my way, Nan”

She has thick waves of hair, naturally parted. Her eyes are as dark as the soil that she walks on, oblivious to the million pieces that shatter underneath her every step. A forgotten smile paints itself on her freckled face, rose-pink lips stretching to each corner, forming a number of creases on either side and an indentation on the right side of her cheek. A smile that was lost for so many years. A smile that should’ve come sooner. Regret sinks in.

Before she knows it, she’s at the river. It seems to have carved its way through the greenery even more deeply than she had remembered. She offers a reflection to the towering giants that sit along its bank. They hug the earth in such a way that they can move their limbs in every direction, picking and choosing to let the sun in. It’s like a game to them. A rustling against one another that resonates all through the forest. A welcome back performance. Just for her.

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Unlonely centenarians: the secret power of Super Agers

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Sharon Leitch

100 candlesNot many people make their 100th birthday. It’s a big deal, and rightly so: the family celebration and obligatory photos, the card from HRH (not so far off the Big Day herself), perhaps a write-up in the local paper. “Tell us!” the journalist asks, “what is the secret of your longevity?” We collectively lean forward to catch their snippets of wisdom. What is their secret? A Philosopher’s Stone? The Elixir of Life? After all, living for a Very Long Time is as close to immortality as we can achieve in the here-and-now.

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The power of the primary source

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Barbara Brookes

Margaret Tennant Childrens Health The Nations WealthIn 1976, Professor Cyril Dixon, Head of the Department of Preventive and Social Medicine at the University of Otago, handed me a Preventive Medicine Dissertation written in 1942 by a 5th year medical student. I was a twenty-one-year-old history honours student working on a dissertation on abortion in the 1930s. Donald McAllister’s dissertation provided a source I never imagined existed: an interview with a ‘backstreet’ abortionist. Here I learned of the desperation of the mainly married women who had abortions performed in the back of the abortionist’s car. He knew his anatomy and about sterilising his implements (a No. 8 gum elastic catheter, slightly modified) and how to protect his identity (by performing his services in the dark). I tracked down Dr McAllister who was happy to speak to me and I learned even more. I was fascinated by his insights into the murky, undercover world of backstreet abortion.

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Trust your instincts

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Jess Thompson

small servingAs a nutrition student, I have developed an immense appreciation for food and have become infinitely grateful for the role that nutrients play in keeping us alive and healthy. So I was very surprised when my younger sister fell ill with anorexia nervosa. She had watched a set of emotive health documentaries and had read numerous articles that slam key dietary components such as sugar, while promoting healthy eating and weight loss. This prompted her to follow a so-called “healthy diet” with the aim of losing weight. This shocked me because my sister already had a slim figure and had never been one to care about her health.

Weeks passed with her meal sizes decreasing, her exercise increasing, and her care for healthy food progressing from an interest to an obsession. She became consumed by health gurus on social media and took every false health claim to heart. Her healthy eating stint progressed to the point where she would refuse to eat any foods containing preservatives or oil, was suddenly a self-proclaimed “coeliac” and “vegan”, and was “lactose intolerant”. Eventually she was admitted to hospital with a weight of only 41 kilograms and an alarmingly slow heart rate of 29 beats per minute. She was at risk of heart failure, and we did not know if she would survive.

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