Welcome to The Good Listening Podcast where we share the healing power of listening and poetry through the stories of healthcare leaders, heroes, and healers, as told to our Listener Poets. This is a creation of The Good Listening Project, a nonprofit that helps fight burnout and supports wellness and resilience in healthcare.

This first episode of The Good Listening Podcast focuses on burnout. A frequent topic in our conversations was the emotional, spiritual, and physical exhaustion resulting from stress and burnout. Even though these poemees acknowledged burnout as an occupational hazard, many expressed being unprepared for the extent to which providing care during a pandemic would increase their own and their colleagues’ burnout.

Many of the poemees we listened to were actively engaged in the creative process of making meaning during the stressful and often chaotic world of COVID-19. Physicians spoke of finding ways to keep treating patients whose prognosis was not good. They also shared the challenge of moving forward following the death of a patient. Medical educators often wondered whether their actions were making the impact that they hoped--especially during the fast pivot to remote learning in the early days of the pandemic. And many Poemees found themselves dealing with their own personal losses as a backdrop to losses they faced on the job.

“Conflicted” is a word to characterize some poemees’ feelings towards the tension between their work lives and their personal lives. Many poemees were partners, spouses, parents, and other caregivers in addition to being healthcare and medical education professionals. However, some semblance of balance among these roles was often elusive. 

Whether poemees were medical and other health professions students, residents fresh from med school graduation, or physicians and other healthcare providers with decades of experience, many were working through what it meant for their own identities to be undergoing transformation. Often, transitions appeared linked to role changes in a poemee’s personal life, work-life--or both. And as with so many of our conversations, the pandemic played a leading role and was often the spark that ignited reflections about identities in flux. 

A common theme of many conversations we had in 2020 was COVID-19 and loss. For poemees, some of these losses were hospitalizations and deaths of friends and family members from the virus. Others suffered losses stemming from not being able to interact in person, face-to-face with family members, colleagues, students and others. Many were left wondering if things could ever return to the way they were before the pandemic. 

What happens when the healers are the ones who need healing? This is a question that some poemees asked themselves as they reflected on their own suffering even as they remained committed to helping alleviate the suffering of those in their care. Recognizing their own need for help, instead of carrying on as if everything were fine, could sometimes be its own struggle. 

To feel--including to feel pain, discomfort, fear, shame, and grief--was, for some poemees, a conscious choice. These healthcare professionals and educators may have previously had a greater comfort level with sectioning off some emotions in order to do their job well. But many were finding that their own humanity could not be escaped--and indeed, should be embraced.