One of my reflections in my first few months as an FY1

I started this job thinking I know a little something, a little about disease, a little about healing and holding. I learnt quickly that ‘little’ is really true, but I also learnt I know a lot about a lot that matters & rarely saw light before. I know how to feel, to see misery and death and take a second to process it. To slow down when everything & everyone is moving at 120 beats per minute. My rhythm goes awry at times, I’m not immune to all the haste around me. I change form sometimes, I become a mirror of the people around me. But what I know is I’m aware of it, I get tired of it, and I want to be myself. When I work in my rhythm, people can sense it. Patients can feel when you slow down, even if you’re running around. This makes all the difference. When a patient tells me I’m patient, when they tell me I’m kind, when they thank me. It makes everything feel so real & beautiful. I’m learning more about pain and holding silence.

I’m in awe every time we break bad news and people handle it. I stand there & think to myself, how? From one morning to the next, we get to be messengers of people’s life quality and duration. I’ve seen avoidant messengers and kind ones. Needless to say which is better! Yet I find either makes it work, the patient eventually finds a way. It makes me commend the human being, so delicate & resilient at the same time.

Every day makes me want to be kinder. It makes me contemplate on the luxury of time & how me spend it. I wish that love & slowness were more trendy than checklists & speed. I wish, thus I’m aware, and able to make this change.

I pray to be given the continued strength to choose love & humility in this journey. It seems obvious that empathy & kindness should be core in our work. But in reality, over time, some things make it fade. The pain can be too consuming: The conversations overwhelming, and perhaps one day mundane.

So it makes me think, one can study and learn and this is established, expected practice. But can one continue to invest in their mental & emotional well being to self-sustain & provide.

Zeynab Hemmati

F2, North West of England Foundation School

September 2026

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