Writing for Anatomy

The first thing we knew about our cadaver was that we should not call it a cadaver. It was a person. But it wasn't alive. We didn't know how to use that in sentences, so we'd begin to refer to it as a cadav--, before catching ourselves and saying, "Our body," instead, like it was something we owned, which felt worse.

The second thing we knew about our body was that it was a she and that her name was Debbie. This helped, because now in reference, we could say something like, "Thank God Debbie looks fit," which simply meant we wouldn't be elbow deep in adipose tissue half way through the dissection. This taught us how to say “Thank You.”

The third thing we knew about our Debbie was that she died at age 46. We did not like knowing this. We tried to escape our feelings by immersing ourselves in a cerebral game of pursuit for a suitable cause of death. Subdural hematoma. Car accident, perhaps. Congenital heart failure. Aortic rupture. An uncommon medical malady? Someone in our group suggested cancer, said that one of their favorite professors had just been diagnosed with late stage breast cancer, absolutely devastating. That brought us back to our feelings.

We did not like knowing that Debbie died when she was 46.

The rest of the things we knew about Debbie we learned slowly. I noticed a hideous blue-green iridescent shade of nail polish on her fingernails. I wondered if she had decided on that color herself or if it was chosen by an out of touch mortician for the funeral service--if she had had one. But I learned I would always give Debbie the benefit of the doubt. The formalin she was awash in probably soaked into her nails and leached the original color, just as the 10% formaldehyde solution found its way under my nails, despite the barrier of vinyl gloves, and stayed with me.

We learned from Debbie that the process of cutting open a human body is not horrifying. We learned from Debbie that the skin on the middle of the back is thick, but not so thick that a fresh scalpel needs much pressure applied to it to get where it needs to go. I learned from Debbie that I am very good at removing fascia. I learned from Dr. Oblinger that fascia is only connective tissue. I learned that you can feel really good about yourself that first day for helping your group with the dissection, but when you look down at your hands and see off-white gloves covered in flecks of skin, hair, and connective tissue, you will no longer feel right. That day, I learned that the urge to drop scalpel and run, the fear of death, would reaffirm my own life. But thanks to Debbie, I soon realized that I would learn a lot about life from death.

So thank you Debbie.