Disclaimer: this post is a rant.
I’m ranting because I think it’s unfair how some people behave towards people that are nothing but courteous and professional towards them.
So here’s the tea:
I was assigned to a particular patient when I joined my team and I’ve followed the rules, I ensure I explain procedures to her, why they’re being done, how they will improve the management of her condition – the whole 9 miles – trust me not every doctor out here does this, and by the time I finish this story you’ll understand why.
Few days into managing her, she begins to lie about things, throw baseless allegations, and even asked for me to be removed as her managing doctor. This all happened on the one day I was absent from the round for a conference; when I came back the next day I hadn’t a clue of what had transpired in my absence and had continued in my normal manner, and she too had continued as though she hadn’t tried to get me unemployed 24 hours earlier.
My saving grace was documentation; whenever I made any contact with her I’d ensure it’s recorded in the medical file, so I was able to be defended – but honestly I was so hurt by the things she’d said about me, and it upset me even more to have to continue being her doctor despite her clear dislike for me.
At a point I considered raising the issue with her, like just to know, what exactly is your problem with me? Because I’ve been doing this work for the past 8+ months and I’ve never had these sort of complaints filed against me; but I thought better of it – if the same person could pretend she was cool with me the very next day, my words could easily be twisted into being confrontational and that is never a good look for a doctor. Being a doctor means you’ve always got to be the bigger person and quite frankly it’s tiring at times because you’re human too after all.
So instead, I just decided to gist with God about her, I was like “are you seeing what I’m going through? She turned my extra time spent on explaining her management into a complete lie! She’s tried to ruin me numerously, what should I do? You know I can’t swap her with anyone, but I need peace of mind” – and that’s what He gave me. Somehow somehow, her lies became more and more apparent, such that everyone in the team knew she was confabulating and trusted me more. Crazy right? What was the cause of distrust became the reason I got trusted. God really does have a sense of humor.
So yes, although she does continue to try to tarnish my reputation at any given opportunity, it no longer upsets me and I think that’s a lesson, not all fires will get put out, sometimes you just become fire proof instead (shout out to Khaleesi lol).
Thanks for reading my little rant!
Till next time,
Dr. ETP xo
