“I have been imagining and yearning for something like this, and it was just magic.” Naomi, a resident doctor, shared these words after her first circle. She had nearly not come. Everything that day had run over, and not much had gone right. She felt exhausted. She had talked herself out of it three times before she walked through the door. But she came, and by the end of the evening, she said she hadn’t known how much she had needed it.

I have heard versions of that sentence every time I have held a sister circle. And this is what I think it reveals: for many women doctors, placing ourselves last is not just a habit, it is our default setting. We postpone the nourishment and connection for later, for when things calm down, for when we have more time.