Why I Am Stressed

I am under stress. I wish I were understressed but this is not true. I wish I were over stress but this is also untrue. Instead, I am under stress. When I am under stress, I tend to like word games. Word games make me relax.

1.
The house is messy. It is always messy. I have little time to clean it up. Having been to other physician's houses, I have occasionally enquired as to how they keep their places spotless. The answer has typically been that other physicians hire cleaners. I cannot afford a cleaner - not yet anyway. Therefore, the house is messy. I have now decided that come next week I will dedicate two days of vacation time to clean this house up.

2.
I have two days of vacation to clean the house up and three days to do nothing. I was planning to spend it a certain way but those plans have fallen through because someone near and dear is no longer near although he remains dear. Losing near and dear people sucks.

3.
I am doing pediatric emergency medicine and it makes me want to get my tubes tied. Screaming kids. Vomiting kids. Shitting kids. Smelly kids. The only time they ever smile is when I'm not around. I am never as glad to see a kid as when I am looking at their backs on their way out the door. I like kids when they are well. I like kids when they are too sick to talk or cry. Otherwise I don't like kids.

4.
I have a research project due next week.

5.
I made a cheesecake. It was delicious. It needed vanilla extract. The computer did not. I mistook the computer for the cheesecake and now my computer is fried. I smartly backed up my data on my computer on a different drive. Not a different computer.

6.
See number 4 and 5 since they are linked like obligate parasites.

7.
I have exams in September. Yes, more exams. I am currently toxic from overdosing on exams. My exams are so I can get another two letters after my name. I already have 6 letters after my name. Do I really need another 2?

8.
I never feel confident enough to know that I am going to win today. I never know. You can never know. I still never know when that ambulance comes in and unloads that sick sick patient whether or not I am going to win. Not knowing is hard. Not knowing sucks. Knowing that I'm going to lose sucks even worse.

9.
Whenever you win everyone else takes the credit. The surgeons, the internists, they are the heroes. Unconscious patients never see my face or hear my name, so how could they give me credit? Emergency medicine is the most spat-upon specialty, it seems. We are called names: "consultologists" being a favourite one because "all you do is consult". The consultant gets the credit when the patient leaves hospital in a car; the emergency physician gets the shit when the patient leaves the hospital in a bodybag.

10.
I don't have a 100% save rate. Nobody does. But I can save 99 lives and lose 1 and only ever hear about the 1 I lost. See 9.

And yet, and yet, and yet....

I still love what I do. I live for it. I go to work and I love what I do and I don't know why I love it but I do. Nobody else might know that I make a difference but I know I make a difference. Because that consultant doesn't get there before I do. He might have the surgical skill to open up a patient and operate on that leaking bowel and thus save the day. But he isn't there to resuscitate that patient, to start those immediate lifesaving measures. I am. My patients seldom thank me, they seldom leave happy. They want to see the specialist. They want to be referred, not told by the lowly ER doctor who "knows nothing" that they are fine. They think I am "just a GP", what do I know?

It's not the most rewarding job in the world if I'm looking for external validation. I'd be better off being something else besides a doctor. I'd be richer at the very least - and not blamed and scorned for it. Instead, I work my ass off in a profession which the public turns against in times of recession for being "fat pigs" living off "the fat of the land" in lean times - I get to hear doctors being envied for "making tons of money" - while I work my ass off in the emergency room dealing with sick patients, vomiting, bleeding, shitting, pissing patients, aggressive, screaming, angry patients, hostile and abusive families. I get to do that and make $50,000 a year after 4yrs of medical school and 3yrs of residency - half of which goes to taxes.

It's not worth the money.

It's not worth the effort.

It's not worth the time.

It's not worth the abuse heaped on us by patients.

It's not worth the scorn and envy of the public.

But to me, it's worth the 99 lives I save. It's worth every bit of that because I make a difference. So yes, I am under stress. Yes, I am sometimes bitter and always cynical. But I love what I do. Sometimes I think I could have had a better life doing something else. But I wouldn't love something else more than I love this. The emergency room, that is what I love.

I guess I'll just keep doing it until I don't love it anymore.