Stay with me. I’m writing this as a human who witnesses suffering first, then a pediatric intensivist, and then a clinical ethicist. So, like this:

Human > Pediatric Intensivist > Clinical Ethicist

I’m writing this with the utmost respect for all the physicians, nurses, and ethicists who have researched this topic and are trying so hard to help us out of this burnout hole we find ourselves in.

My husband and I are re-binging the first two seasons in preparation for the new season of Ted Lasso being released. For the uninitiated, Roy Kent (played by Brett Goldstein) is an angry, foul-mouthed curmudgeon of a soccer player (ah, apologies, footballer) who (spoiler alert) turns out to have a massively huge heart.

How many times has this thought crossed your mind? I can start the day with the best of intentions and then get to the end of the day feeling that I haven’t accomplished a single thing (even when “the end of the day” comes an hour and a half after I’d intended the day to end).