When Breath Becomes Air
Book - 2016
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Add a Quote"You can't ever reach perfection, but you can believe in an asymptote toward which you are ceaselessly striving."
"... As a resident [neurosurgeon], my highest ideal was not saving lives - everyone dies eventually - but guiding a patient or family to an understanding of death or illness. ... The families [of the patient] see the past, the ... memories, the freshly felt love, all represented by the body before them. I see the possible futures, the breathing machines connected [to] the neck, the pasty liquid dripping [into] the belly, the possible long, painful, and only partial recovery - or, sometimes more likely, no return at all of the person they remember. In these moments, I acted not, as I most often did, as death's enemy, but as its ambassador. I had to help those families understand that the person they know ... now lived only in the past and that I needed their input to understand what sort of future he or she would want: an easy death or to be strung between bags of fluids ... to persist despite being unable to struggle." (p. 87-88)
ArapahoeMaryA
Jan 26, 2017
...When you come to one of the many moments in life when you must give an account of yourself, provide a ledger of what you have been, and done, and meant to the world, do not, I pray, discount that you filled a dying man’s days with a sated joy, a joy unknown to me in all my prior years, a joy that does not hunger for more and more, but rests, satisfied. In this time, right now, that is an enormous thing.
You can't ever reach perfection, but you can believe in an asymptote toward which you are ceaselessly striving.
I was less driven by achievement than by trying to understand, in earnest: what makes human life meaningful? I still felt literature provided the best account of the life of the mind, while neuroscience laid down the most elegant rules of the brain.
Summary
Add a SummaryAfter ten years of medical education, Paul Kalanithi was on the verge of completing his training as a neurosurgeon when he became concerned about his own health. At first he blamed the rigours of residency, but a CT scan soon revealed the worst: cancer in the lungs, spine, and liver. Early in his university career, Kalanithi studied literature, dreaming of a career as a writer, but was driven to medicine by questions about mortality and meaning that he felt could not be answered by literature alone. Suddenly, those questions became urgent and personal, and the only time left to write a book and achieve that dream was now.
This book is one of the best 75 books in the past 75 years and it was just published this year. It will be truly a classic when you consider it’s about a neurosurgeon who discovers he has lung cancer. As the summary on the back of the box says – “One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live.” Only 36 years old Kalanithi had many questions he wanted answers to – “What make life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away?” Together with his large, loving family Kalanithi discovers the meaning of life. He was a brilliant writer and surgeon and was transformed as he explored literature in pursuit of what is important in life. I admire that he found what he was looking for and reported in a sensitive, matter-of-fact way without sentimentality.
Comment
Add a CommentThis autobiography goes beyond the usual chronological sequences in the life of a medical student/resident. Despite the moral pressures that the author faces while undergoing various treatments and the dilemmas that he faces, Kalanithi reminds his audience that making the most out of the small moments can be crucial to one's happiness.
What a brave man. This book is inspiring, thought provoking and so beautiful. A must for all of us.
So glad I picked up this book. It was truly enlightening for me. My husband has advanced prostate cancer and is undergoing treatment. However. my husband and I are senior citizens. To get to know this younger man and his family, and their devotion to one another during the his struggle with lung cancer. was inspiring. Very well written. A good read for anyone.
Extraordinary, insightful, poignant. A personal journey taken with deeply felt observations seen through a glittering glowing awareness of each moment.
Would read again. 5 of 5 stars.
Good author. Recommend. Will be one of the books I buy in the future.
One of the best books I've read in a long time. Paul Kalanithi aspired to be a writer before he became a surgeon and the words just flow. Yes, it's a sad story, sad that we lost someone this gifted at any early age, but he gives us the gift by sharing his life, his desire to find meaning in life, his illness, and his death.
Do look up Bill Gates review of this book. It's far more eloquent that what I've shared. Also, look up Lucy Kalanithi and her life after Paul. Sometimes new opportunities come in strange ways...
After losing my 45 year old mother to an obscenely aggressive Lung Cancer at the age of 15, I could still relate to this breath-taking account of life on death's terms.
To this little human and loving wife that Paul left behind, I pray that the insight he bestowed affords comfort in your times of sorrow and enriches whatever wake he has left behind.
What a brilliant mind!
A good read. Paul generously and openly shared his experiences, sufferings and thoughts when test confirmed he had cancer. I'd have send a friend of mine this book but unfortunately he just passed away prior to my reading this book. The stages and experiences he had undergone were similar to Paul's and I'm sure having a reference during those difficult moments would be useful.
Did the author jeopardize his health by the grueling regimen to train to be a neurosurgeon? The technical and medical terms in this memoir (such as a 'dehiscent' wound, pressors) interfere with the narrative when simple, descriptive language would have been more meaningful to the reader.
I've breezed through this book in 2 days, crying...it's a must-read and relatable on a deep, human level. Both doctor Paul's life and death are inspiring, it's a shame he's no longer with us, but what a great legacy he's left behind. May he rest in peace. Read this book!