1.5 years of working

ahh i wanted to do this when i hit my 1 year mark but i never got around to it and haven’t been able to blog in a long time actually.

sure, i’ve learned a lot in school but i’ve also learned a lot as a clinician and in these 1.5 years of working. things that were hard and eye-opening and honestly sometimes really frustrating. but lessons learned are lessons learned and i wanted to spend time to reflect on these lessons since i’ve started work.

• people sometimes have a hard time understanding what i’m saying or explaining so adjusting my teaching and communication style with each patient is tough. sometimes even having to do it during the session with 1 person is hard and frustrating.
• i really don’t like repeating myself but mostly when the patient asks the same question over and over again and especially when they’ve verbalized their understanding but then asks it again. it makes me feel like i’m not being heard and i know in general, i don’t like that feeling.
• not letting my frustration and impatience show is hard
• working with family has its unique challenges
• directing employees on what to do and seeing them not follow through or do it incorrectly is annoying but also recognizing that i correct in a gracious manner and also figuring out when and how to correct is another challenge
• i can code switch between 3 languages but it becomes harder to do with each passing hr or if i’m totally mentally drained
• i desire to give all my patients as equal education as possible which lead me to learn spanish
• i can multi-task like there’s no tomorrow. seeing pts, writing notes, answering phone calls, checking insurance, calling pts back, rescheduling people, checking pts in/out, what did they say last time, how did they feel last time, what did we do last time, what are they saying today, how should we progress/regress their treatment plan today, what time did they come in to know when they should leave by, if we have xyz patients coming in then this room needs to be empty, which pt needs to go where based on their POC, now all of that but with multiple patients…
• working and talking with people who don’t speak fluent english can be extremely difficult and frustrating
• some insurance companies limit how many visits patients can come in for
• people like to haggle on their copay/deductible
• doing follow up calls are personable and helpful
• marketing is a whole other job but worth it once you start getting referrals
• if i absolutely need to, i can see 21 patients in one day. i would obviously and ideally NOT want to do that ever but people were out of town and patients wanted to come in
• some days i really don’t want to go to work because the patient care is tiresome
• it really takes just 1 person to drain so much energy from me
• there are kind patients out there who gift me with sweets, tell me kind words about my care to them, are super chill and lowkey people, and make the day better
• some people are entitled and/or “know-it-alls” who don’t let the expert talk or explain anything

i’m sure there’s more things but these are the main takeaways. i’d be curious to see how this list looks come 3 years into working…we’ll see i guess 😛