12 Days of Reflection, Part I

You are invited to read the following reflections, which were submitted by employees of USA Health. Great appreciation to all who shared their stories and thoughts and gave us permission to share these reflections. Enjoy!

Day One: Finding the Sunshine

“If you can’t find the sunshine, be the sunshine” has been our theme for the Spiritual Health and Counseling Department for 2025. We have focused on being the sunshine for others even though a day may be overshadowed by a gray cloud. Placing our own emotions, needs, and priorities to the side as we care for others is what we do most of our days in healthcare. We serve others and probably all agree that we were called to serve, hold our patients in our hearts and believe it is a privilege and an honor to be here. Often, it is in service to others that we receive the greatest blessings. Pouring from an empty cup is not possible, though. We all need to take the time to find our own sunshine – it really is all around us.

Finding Sunshine at the Beach

Listening to the waves breaking just a few feet from my toes

Feeling the sunshine warming my skin and hugging my soul

Sinking the legs of my chair deeper into the sand to steady my position

Contemplating how much people would pay if the beach charged admission

Swaying to the various tunes playing from those who surround me

Blinking back tears when a lyric reminds me of those I no longer see

Tasting sand crunch in my teeth from the spattering of nearby feet running

Braving to leave the umbrella for a moment to try sunning

Smelling coconut in the spray as I protect my skin from the sun’s rays

Savoring the peace and tranquility that comes with this bright day

Grinning at the young men having handstand competitions

Scoring them each a 10 for effort and ambition

Laughing out loud as a pirate and shark stroll across the edge of the ocean

Experiencing the surprise as the spectators roar in commotion

Warming my heart is the young couple in love, on their own little isle

Reaching out to hold my husband’s hand knowing a love that lasts mile after mile

Wiggling my toes, which are now buried in the cool sand

Adding a note to have more of these beautiful sunny days planned

Observing a seagull with a wing hanging lower than others

Hoping he can fly with his feathered sisters and brothers

Trying to brave the ebb and flow of the waters so strong

Surging with energy as I jump waves, and my heart sings a song

Resting once more on the beach under the shade so very nice

Sipping some lemonade and crunching some ice

Witnessing a family laughing and riding in waves crashing

Noticing a gentleman watching them from the shore, yet his eyes have no passion

Standing so still and carefully not moving, this man without mission

Aching, I realize he has sight but not vision

Turning, I find him looking for his chair and umbrella

Returning to his spot on the shore and standing lost and so mellow

Finding something he knows, he adjusts the string on his pants

Fidgeting with this task, yet never moves again or changes his stance

Imagining what his life was like in years past and long gone

Guiding him gently, a young boy holds his hand and guides him toward home

Realizing that sunshine is always within our reach

Flooding my heart is the light I found today all over the beach

Chaplain Kim Crawford Meeks

Manager, USA Health Spiritual Health and Counseling 

Day Two: Make a Dramatic Impact on Someone’s Day

“The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear!” – Buddy the Elf.

Buddy the Elf surely is full of Christmas cheer all year long, and it got me thinking: While we don’t necessarily have to be full of Christmas cheer every day of the year, we can be just as full of positivity and sunshine. Let us have overwhelming love for others, be kind, provide silent acts of service to make someone’s day a little sunnier. Let’s move into 2026 with grateful hearts and a mindset to serve others. One small act of kindness can start a chain reaction of positivity! Let someone merge in front of you even if they aren’t using a blinker, pay for someone’s coffee, offer a compliment; these are all things that can make a dramatic impact on someone’s day! God bless you all!

Emily H. Dahlmann, DNP, RN, SCRN

Stroke Program Director, USA Health 

Day Three: Gift of Time

As this year draws to a close, I find myself reflecting on the one resource we all share yet experience so differently: time. Working in obstetrics and gynecology has taught me many lessons, but none more humbling than the way time can expand, contract, and reshape itself depending on what our patients — and our teams — need.

For years, I thought the way time slowed during the most stressful, high-stakes moments was almost a kind of punishment. In the middle of emergencies, when every second felt suspended, I wondered why those moments stretched so long and so heavy. But with experience and with the privilege of caring for patients during the most vulnerable hours of their lives, I’ve come to understand those elongated moments differently. Time was not punishing me; it was gifting me space. Space to process clearly. To plan. To breathe. To trust my training and the colleagues beside me. To make the best decisions possible for the people who rely on us. To be grateful. And to give grace.

And then there are the other moments – the joyful ones, the ones filled with laughter, teamwork, and connection where time seems to disappear altogether. A great shift, a shared victory, a quiet kindness, or an evening with the people I love at home – those hours always seem to pass too quickly. They remind me of how precious time is, and how lucky I am to share it with anyone and everyone. Every day we walk through the doors at USA Health, we are choosing to spend time together.

This season, I am choosing to be grateful for all of it. The long moments and the fleeting ones. The ones that stretch me and the ones that fill me. We truly only have the present, and I am profoundly thankful for the people with whom I spend it – my colleagues who inspire me, challenge me, and keep me grounded; and my family and friends who lift me up when I need it most. Contentment can be found in the smallest of places but have the greatest of impacts.

Thank you to the USA Health family for sharing your time, your talents, and your hearts with our patients and with each other. It is an honor to work beside everyone.

Wishing everyone a peaceful, restorative, and meaningful holiday season. May we give grace to ourselves and each other.

Nicolette P. Holliday, M.D., FACOG

Professor, Clerkship Director, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology  

Day Four: The Nostalgic Reflection of Christmas and Family in a Foreign Land

Every Christmas season, I find myself in a delightful scramble, racing against the clock to send those cherished yuletide greetings to my beloved family scattered across Australia, Bali, London, and the Caribbean. The challenge of navigating the time zone differences transforms this tradition into a whimsical dance of Santa-esque management. Yet, amidst the rush, I am enveloped in a poignant nostalgia that reinforces the bonds of love, spirituality, and family that my siblings and I were taught so long ago. Growing up in the Caribbean, my grandmother and mother instilled a beautiful lesson in our hearts: On Christmas Day, we must always greet and bless all family members first, then we can reach out to neighbors and friends. This sacred tradition has woven an unbreakable thread of connection and warmth that transcends the miles between us.

As my six siblings and I matured and spread our wings across the globe, our Christmas gatherings evolved into a symphony of joyful chaos. The air would often ring with the sounds of jammed phone lines, flurries of calls exchanged from Christmas Eve to the early hours of Christmas Day, trying to get in before 7 a.m. when we all prepared for holy Mass. Those moments are etched in my memory, filled with laughter, the warmth of shared stories, and the sweet recollection of our family’s holiday antics. We would lovingly recount our feigned woes over the challenges of choosing Christmas décor, the ruined attempts at cherished family recipes, or the frantic race to complete our Christmas home makeovers just in time for the beloved celebration. No matter where we were in the world, these rituals wrapped us in a comforting embrace, reminding us that we remain united, despite distance, bound by love and faith under the watchful eyes of God.

The birth of Christ lies at the heart of our Christmas celebrations, serving as a powerful reminder of our interconnectedness as one family in faith. In my journey across continents and cultures, I have come to appreciate the universal themes of joy, reflection, and celebration that define the Christmas season. Each land attempts to create lasting memories, lovingly uphold cherished traditions, and nurture a profound sense of belonging. How special it is to witness that, despite the differing customs and practices, the essence of family remains at the core of these celebrations. It is a comforting thought that love, compassion, and forgiveness – the values we are taught within our closest family relationships – guide our interactions and illuminate the spirit of Christmas.

As we celebrate together, our love expands, not only within our family units but also reaching out to embrace the world. Christmas is more than a day; it is a heartfelt celebration of togetherness, a reaffirmation of our faith, and a timeless testimony to the power of love that binds us all. It reminds us that, no matter where we find ourselves, we are eternally linked as one big, beautiful family under God. During this magical season, Christmas takes on its own identifiable culture, welcoming foreigners, immigrants, and sojourners with open arms. It whispers to the heart that “you are family; you belong.” The message of Christ’s birth thousands of years ago resonates deeply, sending those much-cherished echoes through our lives to today: “Remember, you are loved beyond measure.”

Antonette Francis-Shearer, Ph.D., CCHW

Health Education Manager, Center for Healthy Communities 

Day Five: Wonder in the time of Advent

I carry with me lessons from the year 2020. Do you? That year, high holy days were particularly strange. Muslim families made concessions during Ramadan. Jewish congregants celebrated Yom Kippur virtually, and many Christians ushered in Advent’s joyful expectation before Christmastide, masked and socially distanced. The holy and the profane got all mixed up together; even in pain, confusion, grief, and loss, there is extraordinary kindness to be found.

When I was a little girl, my mother would bring down Christmas boxes from the attic shortly after Thanksgiving. Whole universes emerged: nativity sets with shepherds visited by celestial beings carrying Divine messages, star-following priests who journeyed from faraway countries to see a God, and a frightened but brave young woman who set off to Egypt under threat or (as depicted in the story's other version) made pilgrimage in the dark of night, on a donkey, for the woman to give birth in a very strange place. All this fantasy lit my imagination. My parents played Christmas music records so that sugar plum fairies would dance into my dreams. Many years passed, and I became the one to set the stage of this drama for my own children. Now, they, too, have grown older and, perhaps only dutifully, participate in family Christmas traditions.

My husband and I, an Episcopal priest, have rehearsed the rhythm of Advent for many years. During Advent 2020, these cues were there, but off and a bit odd. The tree in the church still held families’ wish lists, and services heralded familiar readings: Isaiah 9:2 (“The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.”) and John the Baptist, One is coming who will baptize by fire, and whose sandals, John, himself, is not fit to untie. But the congregation was socially-distanced, masked and prohibited from singing. Still, the message in this sacred story stayed the same: “Do not be afraid.”

That Advent 2020, standing on my front stoop, sucking in the night air and staring at my neighbor’s lights, I saw the lights as metaphors. Christmas lights (and all the rest of it – the sparkles, the rapturous Nativity figurines) point us toward a claim about the world that there is good in it, even in difficulty, even in despair. In this sense, Advent 2020 was not an aberration from the Christmas story, but a particularly vivid expression of it. And so it is with all Advents and Christmases. It is precisely when we find ourselves in anguish that we are ever closer to those mythical figures – the bewildered shepherds, the journeying Maji, the frightened young woman and man. We are them, and they are us.

What my younger self knows is that there is indeed a conundrum underneath what appears as mere mundane reality. It need not be a religious belief, but a brave one: that the enduring and strange, wondrous mystery of existence is that even in pain, confusion, grief, and loss, there is a great, expansive and extraordinary kindness and beauty. And the amazing thing is, dear reader, you don’t have to look very far, since that kindness lies within, and always has.

Peyton McElroy, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor, Division of Medical Education, Whiddon College of Medicine 

Day Six: Being Present in Life

When I think of Earth rotating around its axis at about 1,000 miles per hour and revolving around the sun at a rate of about 67,000 miles per hour, I cannot help but think how we chase stability, yet everything around us is in motion; seasons change, people evolve, and even the ground beneath us shifts. I have learned that life isn’t about holding on to what cannot stay; it’s about learning to change without losing what is precious and significant.

When you think of it, every moment is a fragment of eternity, and yet it dissolves as soon as we notice it. The fleeting nature of now makes it precious. If life were infinite in every sense, then meanings would vanish. It’s our beginning and ending that give depth to our experiences.

Perhaps the greatest lesson I have learned is that life doesn’t ask us to be perfect; it asks us to be present. To listen when silence speaks, to love without limits or guarantees, and to create, even when the outcome is uncertain. In the end, our goal is to get to a better place, but it is also equally important how we travel there.

Naja Hadad

Director, Laboratory, Children’s & Women’s Hospital