Rachel Naomi Remen M.D.

One of my favorite stories was told by a young medical student who shared a memory from his childhood. As a child he had lived in a Victorian house in San Francisco and his mother used to bathe him every day in a claw footed bathtub. At the end of the bath she would stand him up, pull the rubber plug and reach behind her for a towel to dry him with. One day while he was waiting to be lifted from the tub he inadvertently stepped on the drain, cutting his foot badly on its sharp edge. He had shrieked and his mother had cried out too, lifting him out of the tub, holding his bleeding foot, and warning him to never ever stand on the drain again. So every day after that, when she pulled the plug and turned away from him to reach for the towel, he would be very careful not to stand on the drain. One day he was standing there looking at the drain and being careful not to stand on it when he suddenly noticed the water, circling the drain on its way out of the tub. Seeing this for the first time he became concerned. The edges of the drain were very sharp. What if it hurt the water to circle the drain? So every day after that when his mother lifted the plug and turned to get the towel, he would carefully drop his washcloth over the drain to be sure that the water would not be hurt going down the drain. We were all healers long before we were experts.

Rachel Naomi Remen M.D.