During medical school and residency, slang phrases for death were
inevitable, especially amongst the surgical trainees Thinking back, I'm
wondering if a certain wild and crazy resident from Argentina named
Mario K might not have invented his own terminology for the act of
passing on into the great unknown. I first heard the phrase come out of
his mouth and then from others who worked with him. After leaving Texas
and my training roots, I never heard this expression again. A Google
search for synonyms for the verb "to die" spews forth all manner of
crude expressions as well as the more generally accepted phrases that
one might hear from a funeral director....like "departed", "passed
away", or "left us".
Mario referred to the act of dying as "going to Chicago". I
remember coming in for rounds one morning as an eager, yet terrified
third year medical student and hearing him (as senior surgical resident)
say of someone who had died during the night, "He went to Chicago". I
recalled thinking this an odd blend of disrespectful, weird, and funny, a
not uncommon situation in Medicine when stress-busting humor commonly
borders on the edge of decency, if not beyond. Medical types typically
limit our not-so-professional-speak to times when we're in the company
of others of like mind or those who wouldn't take offense. Discretion is
key.
Yet, "going to Chicago" isn't really an offensive
term for dying. The only question I had then, and still do is what
happens if someone dies in Chicago?
also published at Ahead of the Wave
