Your Heart Is the Size of Your Fist

Your Heart Is the Size of Your Fist is a pleasure from start to finish: timely and timeless, intimate and wise, compelling and informative. Scholtens offers an insider's view of doctoring, powerful stories of refugees creating new lives in North America, and a personal account of balancing motherhood, medicine, and self.

- Louise Aronson, award-winning author of A History of the Present Illness

Your Heart is the Size of Your Fist is impressive--a wonderful read but also a deft exploration of multiple current concerns, from how we care for refugees to how doctors balance their professional and personal obligations and care for themselves.

- Marcia Day Childress, PhD, Associate Professor of Medical Education, University of Virginia

"Scholtens’ memoir is a transformative exploration of a brave, young doctor from a stable, nurtured environment coming of age in a healthcare system unprepared for this growing and struggling underprivileged group who arrive on Canada’s doorstep with so little in the way of material assets yet so rich in experiences. Skillfully through story, she portrays challenges refugees face when adapting to life in BC and her own frustration with how little she believes she helps them. The reader witnesses her discovery and reaction to stories of wounded survivors, from worlds she can barely conceive. Her loving family she portrays as saving her from delving too far into the trauma that she witnesses. Yet she struggles with the competing demands of motherhood and medicine as the two threaten to merge into one, as mother to mother she celebrates with them."

- Dr. Maureen Mayhew

"This book is all heart"

- Riaz Meghji

With her decade of experience with refugees in Canada, Martina brings heart and determination to her patients, as revealed in this book. Sharing the joys and challenges of being a clinician to people whose life experiences differ so much from her own, she writes about dealing with doubts and uncertainty, and cherishing the gifts, concrete and abstract, exchanged between doctor and patient. Skilfully weaving her own story with that of her patients—describing personal loss, challenges to the values of her Dutch Christian upbringing and professional norms—Martina reflects on how she balances her personal life with the demands of her vocation, the need for flexibility in boundaries, and the importance of advocacy when working with marginalized populations. Martina draws us in with vivid stories of doctor–patient exchanges and leaves the reader with a deep appreciation of how humility, curiosity, humour, and good faith can compensate for any deficits in knowledge in cross-cultural interactions.

- Dr. Neil Arya, founder of Kitchener Waterloo Centre for Family Medicine Refugee Health Clinic

Both an eye-opening account for Canadians wanting to understand the challenges facing refugees and a strong argument for refugee health, including mental health, to receive dedicated treatment and funding . . . . Your Heart Is the Size of Your Fist is also about the person in the white coat: a mother trying to find balance between the personal and professional, an a doctor whose patients expand her notions of what a doctor should be.

- Jade Colbert

[Scholtens'] desire to 'reflect, memorialize, and advocate' as a writer-physician is fulfilled in this slim volume. A recommended and accessible read for a wide audience.

- Jenny DeGroot

Captivating . . . Several stories highlight what being a physician entails, including being a healer, advocate, and educator, and often going above and beyond for your patients. . . . I urge anyone interested in primary care or refugee health, along with anyone who would like an honest view about providing culturally sensitive health care, to give this book a read.

- Yvonne Sin, MD "Your Heart Is the Size of Your Fist tells many stories and offers insights into the lives and outlooks of people brought up in very different cultures – and her own life, which as a self-described introvert can’t have been easy. Scholtens is a wise and compassionate guide; reading the book will help anyone who wants to welcome the stranger." —Church for Vancouver blog "[I knew] this would be a book I’d find interesting. What I was not anticipating was that I’d be so compelled by the work as literature, for its shape as a memoir, the glimmer of its prose, and for its depth and richness as memoir. . . . To say that it’s an uplifting and breezy read should not undermine the spiritual weight of Scholtens’ story and its importance—but hopefully it will compel you to read it." —Kerry Clare, author of Mitzi Bytes "Your Heart is the Size of Your Fist personalizes and individualizes refugee journeys through the eyes of their practising physician." —All Lit Up