Forgetting to enjoy the journey

 As I get to the end of F2, I find myself in a rather reflective epoch looking back at the end of another major chapter of my life. I think back to the fears I had about the new-found responsibilities I would gain as a brand-new doctor and whilst some fears were warranted, many of them seem silly with hindsight. Anything that you need to be able to do for your job, you will learn on that job. For instance, I always dreaded the catheterisation sign off at medical school, but when I found myself in a job that requires you to do them frequently, I had no choice but to become better at putting in catheters.  

These fears were mirrored in the transition to being an F2 on the SHO rota with the new responsibilities that this position would entail; from seeing patients independently in A&E to taking in referrals from the wider Yorkshire region in paediatric surgery. The seemingly meteoric jump from medical school to being a doctor on the wards did not feel so meteoric in retrospection. However, this is the period in which I have grown most as a person consciously and I can honestly say I feel grateful for having had these experiences (at least, I can say this now that I am through the worst of it).  

Constantly changing job every four months is challenging, especially when I just want to be a psychiatrist, but I’m certain that when I look back at these two years, I’ll be able to take valuable lessons from every speciality I have been in. As a result of the rapid redeployments, you will inevitably work across many different teams. A positive to this that I feel is quite unique to foundation training, is that you will work with many different flavours of doctors from a wide range of specialties. There are approaches you will want to emulate in your own way, but there will also be styles that you’ll want to avoid like the plague. Ironically, the intense rotas in foundation training have made my symptoms slightly worse but I will save that for another reflection (for my Horus perhaps?). 

As a dewy-eyed F1 in elderly medicine I can remember a great F2 that I looked up to using a particular framing  when she explained decisions around stopping active treatment. I thought this framing helped families get on board with our thought process as clinicians and I have employed this approach myself when having similar difficult discussions with the loved ones of patients. On the other hand, I saw a neurology consultant explain FND in a way that neither myself nor the patient had any idea about what he was talking about. Safe to say I will never attempt to use his analogy for FND.  

Moving on to my final job, paediatric surgery is about as far from the adult psychiatry career I hope to have but there are still many lessons that I’m sure will stay with me till I retire. I have inflammatory bowel disease and during this job, I’ve been reminded of my time as an in-patient in my teens. In all honesty, I don’t think I knew what a doctor actually did back then. They would just appear at random times in the day and decide if some medications were getting changed. I do however remember my friend’s dad who was a consultant in the same hospital visiting me unannounced and giving me a magazine. It sounds silly but I think about this fact often. That a simple act of unexpected kindness has left a bigger impact than any of the clinical care I received.  

I told one of the patient’s with particularly bad Crohn’s disease that I too have inflammatory bowel disease, although I did tell him honestly that I’m glad I have ulcerative colitis when he asked me if Crohn’s is worse. I truly believe that having some conversations with me about what life might be like in the future will stay with him and his family more than most of the clinical conversations he had during his long stay with us. Who knows, maybe he’ll be a doctor in a decade telling some other kid that he can really relate to how annoying it is to be constantly poked and prodded with needles. Ironically, the intense rotas in foundation training have made my symptoms slightly worse but I will save that for another reflection (for my Horus perhaps?). 

Aside from my own health being better, I look back at medical school as a time I thoroughly enjoyed and often feel nostalgic for. Despite this I was incredibly glad when it was over, a feeling that I imagine is all too common for many medical students as they get to the end of what can feel like a genuinely arduous journey. I can now see that what I did well in medical school but struggled with in foundation training is enjoying the journey. At the start of my A&E rotation, my clinical supervisor asked me about my hobbies, urging me to make sure I have a life outside of working and studying. Maybe this speaks to relentless demands of the emergency department and the frequent out of hours shifts but I think this is salient advice for new foundation doctors. Join that sports club or art class that forces you out in the evenings.  

If you take one thing from reading this, I urge you to really think about what you actively enjoy and try to do as much of that as you can. Both in your job and in your life. I like talking to people (hence psychiatry) so I relish at the family updates and difficult conversations that some of the more surgically inclined foundation doctors I’ve worked with seem to dread. As an adult the majority of your life will be spent at work, do all you can to enjoy it.

Medicine is a vast and varied world, take the time to consciously explore it and I think you will be able to find an area that you are truly passionate about.

Danial Rostami-Hochaghan

F2, Yorkshire and Humber Foundation School

August 2026

All previous HOFP articles can be found on on our HOFP webpage

The views expressed in this article are those of the author’s, and do not necessarily reflect the official stance of the UKFPO.