Motherhood, Laid Bare on the Surgery Floor

Looking back now, 19 years later, all I want to do is find that woman and hold her. She was doing everything. Everything. She was showing up to a system that had no language for what she was carrying, no structure to hold it, no curiosity about what it costs to return to a demanding clinical role while your body and your identity are still in the process of reorganising themselves. She was not failing. She was surviving something that was never designed with her in mind.

The systemic lack of compassion - from the culture to the individuals I worked with — is still astounding. And yet I know through listening to hundreds of other women doctors’ experience, that sadly it isn't unusual. I know it's not even close to the worst of it. This is the water we swim in. That's what makes it so insidious. The shame lands on the individual woman. The system stays intact.