Commencing a career of care

Craig Sky has had many patients over the years.

When he was little, there were his brothers, rushing to him with every scraped knee, bumped head, and bruised ego from playfighting too hard.

A few years later there were the children of Step By Step, who immediately sought out then-15-year-old Sky’s comforting presence after rough falls in the playground.

More recently, his patients have included Indigenous people who, cold and scared in the hospital waiting room, have breathed a sigh of relief when he tells them he’s from Kahnawake.

“Everything has pointed me down this road,” Sky said. “I always felt like I was meant to do medicine, I was meant to be in the healthcare field.”

Last month, Sky officially earned a title that many on the school playground have been calling him for years: doctor.

After years of dedicating himself to medical school, he officially graduated fromDr. Craig Sky, and will now be embarking on his next step, a five-year residency practicing anesthesiology in the McGill University Health Centre (MUHC) network of hospitals.

For Dr. Craig Sky, walking across the stage at his graduation was special, but there’s nowhere he feels prouder of his achievements than in the hospital.

“That’s where you really get the sense that you’ve officially made it, you’re really getting to make a change in peoples’ lives, and you get to heal people,” he said.

He remembers his first clinical experience, where he completed a two-week rotation in anesthesiology at the Montreal General Hospital.

“The amount of emotions were absolutely insane and incredible at the same time. It was beautiful, it was scary, it was exciting, it was fulfilling,” he said. “To see your first patient and tell them that it’s your first-ever day in the hospital and tell them, ‘You’re my first-ever patient,’ was such an honour, they’re proud, and my patients were so encouraging of me.”

Sky’s mother, Stephanie Horne, was full of pride to watch her son graduate, having seen his love of medicine grow over the years.

She remembers buying him a human body book in his youth that he pored over, and how he would make a wish at nighttime for anyone he knew that was sick to get better.

The loss of several close family members to terminal diseases in his childhood had a great impact on Sky, and Horne remembers being moved by how seriously her young son understood illness and death.

“He has that emotional intelligence, he has a really strong social conscience,” she said.

She remembers when Sky was in elementary school, and a classmate came back to school after recovering from a nasty car accident.

“He was so concerned about her, he took to her and wanted to make sure that she was safe in the classroom, physically safe, making sure that she always had all her papers,” she said. “He was very, very caring. He understood things at a different level, even at that young age, and he was very perceptive to those that needed some assistance or extra help.”

As Sky prepares to step into the world of anesthesia for the next five years, he’s looking forward to comforting people when they’re at their most vulnerable, providing reassurance before heading into major surgeries.

He describes working in anesthesia as the opportunity to be like a “human dreamcatcher.”

“People are going into operations, often they’re super scared and you’re the person that gets to take their pain away and ease their anxiety,” he said. “You’re going to get them through such a hard time in their life, and you’re going to do it with a mixture of medications and ritual and prayer, and it’s just a really beautiful, special opportunity to have with your patients.”

Sky is especially looking forward to being a positive part of Indigenous patients’ interactions with the medical system, something he has seen throughout his training from other Indigenous doctors including Ojistoh Horn, who he says has been an inspiration to him and other Kahnawa’kehró:non pursuing medical careers.

Horn, who is from Kahnawake, is currently a doctor in Akwesasne, and is president of the Indigenous Physicians Association of Canada. Having known Sky for a long time and worked with him during trips he took to Akwesasne, she said that she’s proud to see him graduate, and hopes he’ll be an inspiration to others.

“Just imagine going into an operating room and being anxious about all of the equipment and coolness of the room, and then to see Craig standing there helping you with your operation. We’re all so incredibly lucky,” she said.

“What’s most exciting is that he is amongst a great number of doctors who are coming out of our community and starting on their journeys. It’s been wonderful to see this vision come true.”

For Sky, medicine is about care and compassion first and foremost, and he hopes to be a comforting presence for all - but especially Indigenous patients who may have had negative interactions with healthcare professionals in the past.

“When I’m in the hospital with my beaded lanyard, my dark hair, my high cheekbones, and I get to tell my patients that they’re amongst themselves, they’re with their own people, they know that there’s somebody in that room who can watch over them, to defend them if they need to, and just to make sure that nothing goes wrong,” he said.

“That’s what’s so motivating to me.”

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