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Welcome to Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine

© Pace Yourself by Medha Cherabuddi. Oil

“Considering how common illness is, how tremendous the spiritual change it brings, how astonishing, when the lights of health go down, the undiscovered countries that are then disclosed, what wastes and deserts of the soul a slight attack of influenza brings to view, what precipices and lawns sprinkled with bright flowers a little rise of temperature reveals, what ancient and obdurate oaks are uprooted in us by the act of sickness… when we think of this, as we are so frequently forced to think of it, it becomes strange indeed that illness has not taken its place with love and battle and jealously among the prime themes of literature.” —Virginia Woolf, “On Illness”

Welcome to the Fall 2023 Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine. We begin our Editors’ Letter with Virginia Woolf’s words to underscore the idea she suggests—that illness is one of the prime themes of great literature. That idea lies at the core of everything we do.

As our Editorial Board pored through the 431 submissions we received for consideration in this issue, we searched for stories that held the ‘undiscovered countries,’ ‘bright flowers,’ and ‘spiritual change’ that narratives of illness, healing, caregiving and suffering hold. We found 51 such narratives—in the form of poems, short stories, artwork, multimedia, essays and Field Notes—that we feel supply the durable meaning that great literature provides. Narrative helps us navigate the difficult but joyful task of living in this challenging 21st century landscape.

We would like to offer some entry points to begin an exploration of this issue’s fine work, starting with our short-form essays called Field Notes. Beholding Something Fine,” by Laura Johnsrude, a retired pediatrician living in Louisville, Kentucky, takes us through the tense “otherworldly work” of a delivery, witnessed while she was in-training during the 1980s. A warning for the faint of heart: there’s green slime involved and a moment where you’ll hold your breath and then gladly exhale. “Flo Owned a Beauty Shop,” by Jose A. Bufill, a medical oncologist in full time clinical practice for 30 years in South Bend, Indiana, begins with a simple search for a diagnosis that turns into a quest to solve a medical mystery that goes well beyond the confines of a hair salon. It’s a little like one of Lisa Sanders’s “Diagnosis” pieces in The New York Times.

© Inside Looking Out 1 by Joanne Philip. FALL 2023 Intima

In Non-Fiction, “Dr. Ortega and the Fajita Man” poses another mystery and an exasperating one—how to persuade a patient to change his behavior. The essay, by Richard B. Weinberg, M.D., a professor at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, helps us all to see how creativity and a bit of effort in community relations can be rewarded. “Body of Work” by Anna Dovre, a second-year resident in Family Medicine, who lives in Saint Paul, Minnesota, goes beautifully beyond the usual cadaver tale of anatomy class and becomes a ‘clear-eyed meditation on the nuts and bolts of mortality,” as one of our editorial board reviewers described it. We’ll also raise a glass to “Last Call,” an essay by Joseph Zarconi, a professor at the Northeast Ohio Medical University College of Medicine in Rootstown, Ohio, about crossing a professional boundary and having a drink with a patient.

 

© RT Journey by Leon Axel. FALL 2023 Intima

Hospitals—and its inhabitants—became fascinating subject matter in a number of Studio Art pieces, including: a triptych of watercolors titled “Inside Looking Out” by Joanne Philip, a junior doctor working in a private hospital in India; “RT Journey,” by Leon Axel, a diagnostic radiologist at New York University Grossman School of Medicine, a series of watercolors of the clinicians caring for him during radiation therapy; and “Oncology Fish,” three in a larger work of photography by Laura Arena, an Argentinian-American writer and visual artist living in Cambridge. Follow us @intimajournal or browse these and other powerful images in our Studio Art section.

 

Many works honor the dying and the dead, from acknowledging those who have opted to become organ donors—see “Honor Walk,” a short story by Galen Schram, a physical therapist and graduate student of Narrative Medicine in New York City, and “Honor Walk: A Message to a Grieving Mother,” a multimedia piece by Angela Cooke-Jackson, a college professor, health consultant and artist. In Poetry, spend a few intense moments reading “On Doctoring” by Asha Jina, a third-year medical student at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in Cleveland, Ohio, or “Papaya,” by Alice Ranjan, a graduate of the University of Washington-Seattle and co-founder of Capillaries Journal.

© Oncology Fish 1 by Laura Arena. FALL 2023 Intima

We could continue offering points of entry, but we have faith you’ll find yours and return again and again to dip into these expressions of “something emotional and personal,” a phrase Oliver Sacks used, that lend meaning to our lives. “Pace Yourself” — and take them in stride — a call out to the incredible oil painting at the top by Medha Cherabuddi, who finds time to paint while doing her residency in internal medicine in Detroit.

The Editorial Board feels humbled by the tough task of discovering what is worth your time and energy and brain power—and we are happy that our efforts have been acknowledged in the world beyond our pages: Essays published in our journal have been acknowledged in the annual The Best American Essays series, including Elise Mullan’s “Things I Learned from Pole Dancing That I Did Not Learn from Residency” (Fall 2022 Intima) and Rana Awdish’s “The Shape of the Shore,” “John in the Rain” by Gary Hunter and “When Suicide Speaks Arabic” by Ibrahim Sablaban (all from Fall 2020 Intima). Many of our past contributors have had books published this year, including Kelley Shinn’s The Wounds That Bind Us and Self-Portrait in Hospital as Camus by physician-poet SK Rancy.

We applaud all of our contributors and single out our Editorial Board, who volunteer their valuable time, energy and brain power to making each issue a worthwhile companion to the work of living and the life of working in the world. Thank you for your enthusiasm and interest in Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine—stay in touch and let us know your thoughts on our new issue.

Donna Bulseco for the Editors of Intima.