Schooling didn’t make me happy either, and I kept searching for what I actually wanted...
Schooling didn’t make me happy either, and I kept searching for what I actually wanted to do with the rest of my life. My father died when I was 29 as a result of a ‘rock ’n’ roll lifestyle’. I hadn’t been in touch with him for a few years, but his death gave me more emotional space to find my own place in the world and become who I am.
The more macabre, the better
I can still clearly remember talking to my mum about what I wanted to do. She was a surgical assistant and had always worked in a hospital. Ever since I was a child, I’ve always been fascinated by scary, morbid things. I like hospitals, and I really get a kick out of gruesome stories about diseases and medieval torture techniques. I remember that, as an eight-year-old girl, I was annoyed that the Gevangenpoort didn’t even have a guillotine. I loved watching hospital dramas like ER and reality programmes about trauma care like Rescue 911. The more macabre, the better. My mum said: ‘Even as a child, you were always fascinated by hospitals, medicine and all things gruesome. I reckon you’d be well suited to anaesthesia.’ Not long after that, I spent a day shadowing staff in the operating theatre at Erasmus MC. A patient was rushed in with his leg completely torn to shreds following an accident at work. And I was completely captivated by the hustle and bustle, and by the surgical team operating like a well-oiled machine. And that’s how I began my career as an anaesthesia assistant.
Here, I felt completely at home, and for the first time in my life I was seen as a ‘model student’. I had the feeling that everything would turn out all right. That, for the first time, I was in control of my own life and doing what I wanted. When I look back on my life, I often think of it as a life before I turned 30 and a life after I turned 30. And for me, the physical principle of ‘the path of least resistance’ took on a whole new dimension. Physiology, psychology, Wing Chun; for me, it applies to everything.
Desi Tamboer
Year of birth: 1986
Profession:
- Anaesthesia assistant at Haaglanden Medical Centre (HMC)
- Pre-operative screening assistant at Haaglanden Medical Centre (HMC)
Place of residence: The Hague
Soon the third part of a total of five. Read more here: Humans of Wing Chun
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