There are more of us than we realize- we just keep quiet to keep the peace. I am loving the meltdowns and the comments on X - it’s entertaining to watch them eat their own. I’ve said for a long time now that certain departments (justice, education, healthcare) need to be scrapped and we need to start over. The corruption, the lies, the lack of accountability is astounding. I’ve watched more wonderful people leave healthcare because they can’t take all the hypocrisy and all the regulations- they just want to help people. I don’t know what the answers are but doing the same thing the same way and expecting a different result just isn’t working. Keep writing and keep us updated! (Hurry back to X- your commentary is missed!)
My career in healthcare morphed into working in the public school system. I resigned from my job a year ago and trying to figure out my next gig. I relate to your words so much and it’s exactly why I will never go back to either of these fields.
I feel like I could have written this, down to the work environment and patient demographic. I too work in a dark blue state with one small saving grace- most of my worksites are in the rural edges of the state where a large percentage of my elderly patients are from an era of hard physical work, large families, and Sunday church attendance. In other words, American cultural values that are more legends than reality anymore. They provide me a welcome sanctuary from the pronouns, DEI trainings and pandemic-origin stupid rules that won’t go away. Sometimes they even say the obvious out loud, which delights me very much.
I will say there are some days I just don’t want to do this anymore. But that’s not because of my patients- I know those of us who are similar to them need to stay - for them.
That's part of the beauty of work from home for white male tech workers. There's little face to face office politics. No water cooler talk. When it does seep into slack channels, it's easy enough to get offline and go do something solitary and physical to blow off steam.
Thank you for mentioning John Carter's essay. For reasons that have nothing to do with professional life, I'm in the same boat you are, and the cost is steep.
Summarizes the entirety of my medical training since starting residency. Too easy for the rainbow lanyard pronoun-wielding core faculty to weaponize “professionalism” against any of us who might disagree with the hours of transgender lectures, DEI meetings, mask mandates, or COVID shots in babies. Nothing has made me want to leave medicine more.
my dad had to tell my grandpa, through a window, that my grandma was dead. the nursing home made him just kneel there in the woodchips while his father cried. that is a crime.
So glad I work (or worked, until a year ago when we sold out to a hospital system) in a private practice in a red state, or I would have faced the same schizophrenic pressures that you did.
There are more of us than we realize- we just keep quiet to keep the peace. I am loving the meltdowns and the comments on X - it’s entertaining to watch them eat their own. I’ve said for a long time now that certain departments (justice, education, healthcare) need to be scrapped and we need to start over. The corruption, the lies, the lack of accountability is astounding. I’ve watched more wonderful people leave healthcare because they can’t take all the hypocrisy and all the regulations- they just want to help people. I don’t know what the answers are but doing the same thing the same way and expecting a different result just isn’t working. Keep writing and keep us updated! (Hurry back to X- your commentary is missed!)
My career in healthcare morphed into working in the public school system. I resigned from my job a year ago and trying to figure out my next gig. I relate to your words so much and it’s exactly why I will never go back to either of these fields.
I feel like I could have written this, down to the work environment and patient demographic. I too work in a dark blue state with one small saving grace- most of my worksites are in the rural edges of the state where a large percentage of my elderly patients are from an era of hard physical work, large families, and Sunday church attendance. In other words, American cultural values that are more legends than reality anymore. They provide me a welcome sanctuary from the pronouns, DEI trainings and pandemic-origin stupid rules that won’t go away. Sometimes they even say the obvious out loud, which delights me very much.
I will say there are some days I just don’t want to do this anymore. But that’s not because of my patients- I know those of us who are similar to them need to stay - for them.
That's part of the beauty of work from home for white male tech workers. There's little face to face office politics. No water cooler talk. When it does seep into slack channels, it's easy enough to get offline and go do something solitary and physical to blow off steam.
Thank you for mentioning John Carter's essay. For reasons that have nothing to do with professional life, I'm in the same boat you are, and the cost is steep.
Summarizes the entirety of my medical training since starting residency. Too easy for the rainbow lanyard pronoun-wielding core faculty to weaponize “professionalism” against any of us who might disagree with the hours of transgender lectures, DEI meetings, mask mandates, or COVID shots in babies. Nothing has made me want to leave medicine more.
my dad had to tell my grandpa, through a window, that my grandma was dead. the nursing home made him just kneel there in the woodchips while his father cried. that is a crime.
I hate hearing stories like that & I’ve heard hundreds of them by now, I am so, so sorry
So glad I work (or worked, until a year ago when we sold out to a hospital system) in a private practice in a red state, or I would have faced the same schizophrenic pressures that you did.