#12 Losing Voice

This week marked my first week in ENT (Ear, Nose and Throat) department. A few days ago, I’ve met a middle-aged patient in the ENT ward while following my specialist’s ward round. When she greeted him, he replied to her by writing on a notepad. It went on for a while until the doctor told my group that he recently had his larynx surgically removed (larynx is an organ which is important for voice production). Therefore, he has lost the ability to talk at all. A few years ago, he was diagnosed with cancer of the larynx. He had undergone radiotherapy but he had failed to respond to it. Since the cancer was extensive, surgery was the only option. I couldn’t imagine the suffering that he had gone through for the past few years and ended up losing his voice permanently after the intervention. Think about the difficult decisions he had to make when the doctor informed him about the potential of losing his voice permanently from the treatment. Try to put yourself in his shoes and ask yourself, make the cancer go away or losing your voice. If it was me, I would have prayed to God for assurance that this is all just a bad dream. It was a heartfelt moment when he complained of being hungry and begged the doctor repeatedly to let him eat food as he wasn’t allowed to eat for a few days after the surgery for quick and better healing. He also begged to go back home to be with his family as he was admitted for quite some time. It was hard for me to look at the distraught on his face as I could see that he was trying hard to adapt to his speech loss. After seeing him, I kept on thinking of how something vital like a voice can be taken away from you without you realizing it. We often take it for granted and use it for gossip, negativity and bitter words. Sometimes, we choose to tear others down instead of lifting people up with our voices. We never realised how essential our voices are as communication is so significant in our daily norms. Imagine losing the ability to talk to your loved ones like how this man couldn’t talk to his family as he used to. Therefore, we should start using our voices the right way by spreading love and positivity to those around us. Whether you know it or not, your voice can do a lot.

#voice #surgery