Unravelling the Golden Thread

Our quest for healing is universal. The differences lie in the paths that we take towards it. I do not believe that we can ever be in full control of the attainment of healing in the bodies or lives of others, but as healthcare providers we crave the ability to do more than what is in our power: We want others to seek out healing, and we want to be the gifted hands that facilitate it. It is a messiah complex we carry with us until the disillusionment of losing patients brings us to our knees. In “The Pledge,” by Keamogetswe Bopalamo, a religious Messiah is juxtaposed against the image of a woman who is beaten and damned by life’s challenges. In Jude Idada’s, “The Monks of Iwu,” a patient travels far to seek healing at a secluded monastery. As I read these stories, I found that there were several similarities in them. A ‘golden thread’ of sorts.

I was introduced to the idea of a golden thread a month ago at an online workshop on Brand Identity which was facilitated by the arts organisation Hear My Voice. During their presentation, acclaimed South African poet Xabiso Vili described a golden thread as the common element in one’s various artistic pursuits that ties it all together into what others may consider a brand. I thought of the stories in this supplement in the same way: what ties us together, besides our shared interest in the intersection of healthcare and literature? What is our brand? I found the answer in the stories we submitted and which are published in this supplement. In Araba Ofori-Acquah’s “Drugs vs. Medicine” I paused and was held hostage by a surprising revelation: that ‘true medicine’, unlike drugs, is not easily packaged.

I remember my Family Medicine rotation in medical school with a mixture of fondness and confusion. We spent a lot of time in the Skills Lab, which I loved for the mere fact that it was a controlled environment where the real dangers of medicine could not reach us. Even the patients we interacted with were mere simulations, either life-size training mannequins or actors—psychology students hired to play the roles of distressed patients in our practicals and exams. Nothing much could go wrong in the Skills Lab, so it felt like a safe space to make mistakes. However, it did not allow me to practise true medicine. It confused me because I had the skills, as the name implied, but not the confidence to apply them in the big bad world of hospitals, clinics, and (gasp) breathing, bleeding people. Olukorede Yishau’s story titled “‘The Mess” set me up perfectly for a reality check.

Real life is messy. Healing is messy. Sometimes the golden thread unravels and we do not find what connects us. In Franka-Maria Andoh’s “All in the Detail” and Chinaza Ebere Eziaghighala’s “Mamas’ Bodies”, there is a common and beautifully understated notion that we need community: we carry not only what replenishes our own bodies, but also, and sometimes only, what can facilitate the healing journeys of others. Ololade Ajayi’s “Collars of Worry” speaks of Grief 101 which I believe is a module we are all forced to enroll in as part of life. It is where we learn to find our greatest strengths. It has been an honour to sit with the work of these brilliant colleagues of mine, through both joy and pain, and to allow their words to teach me, to feed me. In these stories I have found not only the golden thread of our shared existence but many a gold nugget. I leave it to you to do the same.

Nkateko Masinga is the guest editor of Please See Me’s Summer Supplement, 2022.