who i don’t want to be:
the vascular surgery chief residents
who calmly reassured me the path they chose was worth it
i watched the satisfaction glint in their eyes as they imposed on me
the shame and hurt they’d been given by their own superiors.
i broke sterility at 530 pm, 12.5 hours into my work day, setting boundaries for myself
and watched that chief resident gape at me
with his hollow eyes and cortisol overloaded body habitus
wrapped in a shawl from patient blankets,
leaning back into the wall for a moment of stolen rest.
i won’t become him.
i won’t allow this sick american hospital world to tell me that 14 hour work days are normal
and surviving on processed food and five hours of sleep and never seeing the sunlight and never moving my body and
spending every day grinding my teeth and snapping at the people i love because i am saving every ounce of patience and softness i can for my patients
because they don’t deserve to be yelled at
is normal.
i realize i am only one step removed from these patients in this corporate hospital food chain
i am forced to face them daily, to bear the burden of the brokenness of everything above me.
i remember i am supposed to be in charge here, to care for them
but often i feel like i am trying to protect them
from the ways this system has harmed me, has harmed them.
i wonder
who up the chain is trying to protect me
when my superiors sit me down and tell me
to work 14 hour days and eat microwave dinners and forget about time with loved ones or exercise or sunlight
and then my yawning breath that happens when anxiety takes over interrupts this train of thought
forces me to tripod, breathe deeply, try to remember my feet below me breath within me sky above me.
i catch my breath, look up
only to see fluorescent lights and frowning faces
i close my eyes again, try to remember
feet below me breath within me sky above me
try to convince myself
this path is worth it
is it?
