I remember listening to an episode of The Incubator (a podcast about the world of Neonatology, the cutting edge research and the people that are involved with it from all different perspectives) as they interviewed a man named Dr. Rattray, author of a book called When All Becomes New: A Doctor’s Stories of Life, Love, and Loss. He had written a book, that I later on bought for my mom to read, that essentially would help to explain and digest his experiences working as a doctor and particularly his role in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit; and, per the interview on the podcast, a large goal was to try to share with family a more detailed idea of what he went through and what he felt after so many of the trying days we fight. Trying to explain the world of medicine to those not working in it, is virtually impossible, in my opinion; however, as is likely every experience unknown until seen from the first perspective.

I will never forget when I came home from my first call shift as a Neonatology Fellow and tried to convey to my mom how intense the night before had been. I walked in to a situation of a 22+5 week baby (~1 lb in weight) that went into cardiac arrest and required CPR. I can remember the intensity from that night very viscerally as the bedside nurse looked to me for the next steps as she valiantly continued chest compressions. The room filled with more nurses, respiratory therapists and technicians as the code blue button was activated in the early hours after midnight. My attending called cardiology to seek advice and investigate any further treatment options as we realized how futile our movements were becoming trying to resuscitate a human already on the brink of medical viability. Ultimately, we reached a stable but declining heart rate, were able to reach the family, and as expected hours later the baby died.

For years I have been a solo wanderer, a large part of why I started this blog… Partially an outlet for venting, partially as a way of sharing some of my travels and experiences, and partially as an escape from the real world and my day-to-day conflicts. For years I have taken stories like this home alone and sat staring into the abyss trying to understand what had happened. Whether it was staring out of the balcony of my lively apartment in Houston down at the pool full of young people partying and enjoying the blistering summer, or the trees covered in snow across the parking lot as I rested in a hotel in Maine between night shifts, or the pastels of the sunset as they fell behind the mountains in New Mexico, I have stared off into the abyss and in silence decompressed alone.

I have from time to time, had significant relationships that have been able to tolerate the discussion of my day before, but most really don’t understand what we go through as medical providers training and working in the field of Medicine. From death to patient frustration and complaints to falling helplessly under the harsh criticism of medical hierarchy, the stress becomes often insurmountable and some of us have healthy and, admittedly, unhealthy ways of coping and decompression. As I have moved along the world from medical school to residency to the world of traveling alone as a locum tenens provider and then finally back to fellowship, my divide with those around me has grown. I have slowly slipped farther into a solitude and a narcissistic focus of dealing with my stress. Unlike those around me, I have a small and ever-decreasing support system. As I move around, I time and time again find myself in an entirely new area with nobody that I can digest these tough days with, for miles. Family is far and few between and as I go farther into my medical journey, my coworkers and co-trainees have their own families to decompress with and time shared with them becomes rightfully slighted in a various direction. With time, I have become more comfortable alone than with any other soul.

We all need times to decompress from our day. Some of us have relatively more difficult things to emotionally unload than others, but that’s always from a subjective bias and various thresholds of what each of us can handle or grow to handle. It is always easier to share the feelings with those that can understand, but sometimes even to seek companionships of solace even if understanding is only partial. I write this post not for pity nor from a decline in mental faculties asking for help. More so, I post this as an open and honest admission that, behind the smiles and behind the jovial conversation that might be of humor as our complex and common mechanisms of coping, some of us are faced with difficulty in decompressing alone. Someone has to do our jobs, someone has to take on death and the complaints and share with the ups and downs of live, but it does not mean that we do not leave with cemented footprints in our souls. While many may have family or friends or support systems to decompress with, I’m aware more than anyone that many of us don’t, and for them i write this, such that they understand in solidarity that even if there are people to share our experiences with, at the end of the day, we may all face this plight of personal sacrifice.

Image Credit: https://psychology-spot.com/emotional-decompression-defusing/