It is somewhat fitting that my identification as Bacteremia began in the most stereotypical stage of self-discovery, during college. In those days I had begun, as many youths did, to play the new iteration of the Halo games. The Xbox prompted me to choose a username, and having joined a bacteriology-lab a few months prior, I decided on the username Bacteremia (Viremia was taken).
Bacteremia is the presence of bacteria in the blood. Common knowledge dictates that the blood is usually a sterile place and therefore having bacteria is an affront. Bacteria are mean and deadly, and therefore unwanted. In those days I reasoned, what better name to show my competitors as I conquer them online or celebrate by rapidly crouching on their defeated avatars. But surprising no one, very few people knew what bacteremia even meant. At best I would be called variations of the word bacteria during team call-outs and insults.
And so after college I left the bacteriology lab and for a few years I stopped using the Bacteremia handle. This behavior again stereotypical of the disillusioned post-college stage and adulthood’s formative years. The identity lay dormant until a few months into medical school, when the term was called out during a lecture. As if startled by a life-giving jolt, I looked up in glee. I knew that term.
But now the identity was conjugated with concern, as the study of health and disease unearthed previously unexplored depth. As a med student I now better understood how people suffered from bacterial infections. Youthful bravado gave way to empathy and the self-defining question, can I really call myself bacteremia when people have suffered by that name?
Well given that I still identify with the term, you know my conclusion. But I can assure you it was not an easy process. To get here, I had to reduce the identity to its building blocks: what is bacteremia?
Bacteremia is the presence of bacteria in the blood, as I already knew. But through research and introspection I found out that bacteria in the blood is not necessarily threatening. Bacteria in the blood can result from common day-to-day activities like brushing your teeth, a scrape, or even common infections. Bacteremia in this case is asymptomatic and may even clear up on its own. But of course bacteremia has a darker side, as the presence of bacteria in the blood can lead to life-threatening conditions like sepsis.
This is when I realized that bacteremia is not good or bad on its own, but has the potential to be peaceful or problematic. Sad as it sounds, a negative outcome may occur because the bacteria happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Sometimes tragedy may occur because the resources were not there to set the condition on the right path. Thinking about it this way, the identity of Bacteremia resonated with me even more.
But the thing is, there are people out there who will never see bacteremia as anything but a blight. They will curse it and invariably link it to awful conditions like sepsis and death. They will blame it even when the right intervention would have kept it from ending negatively. They will ask, why couldn’t the bacteria just stayed in their place or come into the body the right way?
At present I study the human microbiome. The microbiome includes commensals, which are the microbes that keep you healthy. Likewise people’s faces light up when I mention probiotics. Even the people that hate bugs and infections can see why these matter. These ones are good, no question about it, why can’t all bugs that come into the body be like that?
Of course the obvious consideration given my current research status is why don’t I just change my name to something commensal-related. Why not focus on the good, the best of us, and take people’s eyes away from what they would deride. Why not make my life easier.
I mean yeah I get it, it makes sense. But the thing is, that’s just not me. For every accomplishment others would want to replicate, I have made errors. My life didn’t just spontaneously generate, my community and even stochasticity have played a significant role in making it this far. This entire genera is who I am, to deny it would naturally select against my identity and those that would align with me. Even if it would make my personal growth easier, I cannot morph my narrative or delete the unpalatable traits in my cohort (some of which may be misunderstood because others have not taken the time to learn about them). If I need to sanitize myself to be accepted by those that would otherwise screen me out, then whatever I evolve to is worse than what I am at my base.
To willfully mutate myself into an idealized version by suppressing my errors would make null who I am. You get the point. I am Bacteremia.
P.S.- Or Bacteraemia if someone already took the username
The first Bacteremia avatar (via Halo Waypoint)
Undocumented Physician Scientist in Training 
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