When I was finishing my masters degree in Physical Therapy I did a clinical rotation in a hospital in Houston Texas. It was a large cardiac hospital and the entire rotation was focused on wound management and cardiac care.

I was working with a patient who had a mechanical heart placed. Given the risk of the procedure they had left the mechanical heart on the outside of his body with the intention of doing a second procedure a couple of days later to place the mechanical heart inside of his body when he was stable enough. I was in his room getting him out of bed for the first time after surgery. He was sitting on the edge of the bed and I was moving lines and tubes to allow him to try standing, with my support obviously. I got everything situated, placed the mechanical heart in my hand and my other hand on a belt around his waist to ensure that he was safe when he tried standing. I looked him in the eyes and asked him if he was ready to try standing. His eyes looked over to my hand holding his new heart. His eyes darted back to mine.

“Be careful with that, don’t drop it” he said.

The gravity of what he was saying and what I was doing really hit me. He was trusting me to hold his heart and I was responsible for keeping his heart safe. 

Years later, I experienced this again. Only, this time, it was me handing someone my heart and looking into their eyes asking them to be safe with it, with me.