Brave Enough To Be Bliss

this patient you truly cared for, because if you didn’t care you wouldn’t put yourself through this. So, you feel you have no choice but to push down the feelings and push back the tears. You got to this place in life never letting anyone know when you were scared or imperfect, and so you go on…surviving, but not really thriving in all the ways that truly matter . Your spouse resents you for being gone so much. Your kids don’t understand why you can’t be at every soccer game, and it hurts you to see them hurt, so it’s just easier to stay away. This has simply become the way you keep going through the motions and you justify it to yourself and others because you're saving other people’s lives...except when you can't. Like today.

And so, you go on, until one day, there’s simply no more space left to stuff those feelings and tears. You just can’t take it anymore and you join the 300 -400 physicians who die by suicide each year.

I share this example because there can be a perception that because they have higher incomes, doctors ’ lives must be easier. There are many other very difficult healthcare professions, as well as countless other professions in different industries. It's easy to think that someone else's job or life is easier when you're unhappy with yours. And that's why it is key for each of us to become the healthiest individuals we can be and select a career that we truly enjoy. T here is never going to be enough money, paid time off, or perks if we don’t truly love what we are doing and if we aren’t healthy humans while we are doing it . I don’t know Dr. Schwartz’ s whole story, but I know when I saw his post of his on LinkedIn the spring before his death, the man who was writing these blogs wasn’t the same man I knew at Shawnee Mission Medical Center. The man I knew who could be self-centered, and at times appear unkind, was now a pancreatic cancer patient. At some point, in the past 15 years since I had talked with him, he had become more fully human reaching out for help and support and offering love and concern to all.

These lessons are often shared by those who are dying but are available to us all if only we are brave enough to lovingly look at ourselves and our behavior, seek healing from whatever has hurt us, and live a life of love and grace while we have the opportunity. I am grateful that I caught Dr. Schwartz’ s LinkedIn post that day and was able to follow his journey through his blogs and offer some encouragement. That real, vulnerable, and imperfect human was so much more impressive than the nearly perfect cardiothoracic surgeon I remembered. And while the surgeon I knew wouldn’t appreciate my comments at all, I believe the human he ended up being

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