30-year Reunion (2009)

Sweathogs. My God. Thirty years. We're still alive. Most of us, anyway, thank the Lord. Our thirtieth reunion. Some lesser med school classes are wiped out by this time; we were heat-tempered early on and have spent all this time recovering. It has made us stronger.

With the docs in this country, faced with the cyclical challenges of a broken system, lowered expectations of just missing the Golden Age of Medicine by just a generation, the docs countrywide off themselves at equal rates male and female at a doc a day. While our class has suffered the standard attrition, maybe we have been somewhat insulated as a class because we have stuck together, the Jebbies disdain suicide, and we forged our own unique camaraderie and feistiness. Maybe just the pride of being a Sweathog has been enough.

We have learned early on that if we don't like the grand picture, we can apply hog logic to life, sort of like dog logic, get petted, be lovable and loved (hogs have 30 minute orgasms!), root around, sleep a lot, dream of a leash-free world. Or more like a dog, if you can't eat it or hump it, piss on it and walk away.

But of course, it has been more complicated. Human minds did not evolve to do philosophy or science, rather, to find and eat, fight and flee, love and lose. We ourselves have always been subject to the human condition, in spite of the higher calling of our chosen profession, given at least the tools of faith imbued by our Alma Mater and the cohesion of our class. We at least have the resilience to get beyond the old saw that a pessimist is merely an informed optimist.

What a class we are. Like a cross section of all the country's docs, we're friendly, cranky, arrogant, humble, selfless, confident, intelligent, dedicated. We've had rich rewarding lives, even as some of us have struggled in silence with the specter of the highest suicide rate of any profession. Fortunately, our class has been relatively spared; good thing, since we're supposed to be the strong ones anyway, who care for the sick. The stigma of logging onto doctorswithdepression.com has fortunately been lessened, so other classes have been able to get help. We have learned over the years not to over-think it, have good coping skills, savor life's joys, cultivate optimism. For our families' sake, we have learned to take care of ourselves, say thank you often, keep romance alive (even with the help of, after all, this is our 30th, the little blue pill), don't try to "change" the spousal unit, cultivate friends and hobbies, let free time be free time, donate to the Alma Mater, and attend the reunions.

Besides, the dean taught us in that first horrific year to get over it. Ya got an issue, get a tissue! If ya need a shoulder to cry on, pull off to the side of the road! Thank God we have each other, fellow Sweathogs! We have another 30, so Forward! Into the fog!

Always, your Cosmic Caduceus