Reflection

 

Reflection is such a gentle sounding word, with its watery esoteric meaning, so when I was told I was going to watch a surgical reflection I could not imagine what I was going to see. The point of the operation was to repair two aneurysms that were in very hard to reach areas, that is to say behind other organs. These organs had to move out of the way and that very very simply is a reflection.
   I can only use the metaphor of a tightly packed wardrobe to describe this procedure. Some of the clothes have to come out and the others must be carefully moved along one way and then the other to get at the mending behind. It is the kind of operation where a surgeon must see with their hands. This was the dominant feature of what I saw, that of hands moving with their own sight and understanding.Gentle cradling movements, sliding over one part to find another and lifting soft structures. This was how it was being taught too as it can only be learnt by touch.Hands were guided and taught to feel their way around delicate areas, membranes and connective tissue felt and tested and parted.So material knowledge is gained of all the mysterious areas of the body.
 Surgeons speak of planes within the body but it was not until I watched another type of operation later that I fully understood what this meant.