Hey Friends, I’ve gotten so many amazing, thoughtful messages regarding words of the new year and ground rules for 2022. Thank you for taking the time to respond and share your insights. If you missed those blogs, you can find them here. As we move into February, a relatively short month after the year of January, I want to remind you of a duality we all face – balancing grief with joy. Duality implies recognizing the “and” in life and in our experiences – the co-occurrence of conflicting feelings. While competing feelings can appear to be mutually exclusive, one factor that makes us complicated-feeling humans is that we experience multiple feelings at the same time. And those feelings do not have to be exclusive of each other. They actually co-occur. They exist at the same time, in parallel. Grief and joy. Happiness and despair. Confusion and content. Love and disappointment. Remember the last time you felt immense love for your child only to be confused by his/her behavior? Pride for your job and overwhelm at the same time? Passion for your partner and frustration with him or her? Gratitude for opportunities and despair at obligation? This is duality. We’re entering into year three of this global pandemic. Compounding stressors – oppression, politics, loss, employment, severe weather, illness – all contribute to a degree of hopelessness at times. So, I want to remind you that amidst the stressors and gloom, we must still find joy. Babies are born. Graduations ensue. Love prevails. Anniversaries occur. Sunsets paint tapestry. Loved ones accomplish. Athletes triumph. Melodies inspire. Laughter emits. And this balance is important, friends. In fact, embracing the dualities of life allow us to endure. In the spirit of joy, may I offer a personal experience and reflection? Last month I married my soulmate, my best friend. Dr. Amy became Dr. Amy King. “I” turned to “we” and “us.” Fulfilled, tender and joyous are words that begin to convey this experience. Making promises to our children as we sealed our fate as a family and declared our love in front of friends was an experience I will forever cherish. Having a second chance at love, passion and connectedness is not something I will take for granted. We experienced profound joy. The weeks before? The weeks ensuing? Perhaps not as much – daily life stressors, first responder lives (him), helping healers (me), supporting our children (both), and simply managing life amidst a pandemic – whew, it’s rough! But allowing moments of joy to fill the gaps? Seeing light amidst the chaos? Finding love despite loss? I say yes! So, it is with extreme JOY that I share this news. And my joy does not in any way diminish all of the other hardships that exist in our world. Nor does yours. So, my friends, may I encourage all of you to laugh out loud, love hard, dance awkwardly, enjoy sunrises, and seek out connection. It is our ONLY way through the darkness. With immense gratitude, Dr. Amy (King)! You can still find me at the same email: doctoramyllc@gmail.com – we love to hear from you!

Hello Friends,

Holy smokes, do I have news for you! TWO opportunities to get some support during this time of uncertainty. I know you’re all overwhelmed. I know burnout is real and fatiguing. The only way to address burnout is through connection, support, and practical tools. When we come together as a community and acknowledge how challenging the last 20 months have been, then some healing and reconciling can begin. So, with that being said, here are two opportunities for support. FREE and FREE!!

“Amy, no one had told me that ‘it’s ok to not be okay’ until you did. Thank you for reminding me that we’re human.”
Chief Medical Officer (after Summer Wellness Workshop)

Mark your calendars! The first bit of support is through a free workshop on November 10 at 6pm. Beyond Burnout: Navigating your way through trying times as a provider. In this workshop, we’ll discuss symptoms of burnout, what’s contributing to burnout and how to address what we’re going through. I promise you, I’m not going to give out nuggets that focus on eating better, getting sleep and taking a vacation. I mean, that’s all-important, but I’m going to give you tangible things you can do to address overwhelm. Let’s be honest, we need to focus on what’s possible and practical. And more importantly, when we only focus on a few parts of self-care, we miss the big picture! We’re going to walk through actionable steps you can take to address overwhelm and find more purpose in your work.

Register for this free workshop here.

Join us! Many of you have joined us for Refresh – our monthly meetings for providers to gather as a community, gain tools around resilience-building and gather resources to support your patients. Well, Refresh will now be known as The Provider Lounge: A Community to Build Resilience. The Provider Lounge is a community of like-minded medical providers that want to focus on building resilience in their patients and themselves. If you’re looking for a place to find purpose, create meaning, and respond with practical tools that build buffering forces for whatever our patients face, this is the community for you!

The Provider Lounge is also an online portal for providers. In it, you can access tons of content that build resilience for your patients including scripts, videos, resilience interventions, and cards for connection.

For now, The Provider Lounge is free! Come to a meeting and check out the portal. If you want access right away to see what’s going on inside, just reply to this email and I’ll send you a login so you can join us. Our next community gathering in The Provider Lounge will be Thursday, November 4 at 12:30 pm. And yes, all meetings are taped so that, even if you miss us, you won’t miss the gems!

Join us via Zoom on November 4th at 12:30 pm for The Provider Lounge.

OK friends, I hope you feel like help is on the way. I’m working hard to make myself available, provide resources and free support as much as possible.

See you November 4 and November 10th! Mark your calendars now!

Speaking of free and easy…. did you know that 90 seconds of deep belly breathing has been shown to decrease cortisol by 30%??? Yep – breathing is straightforward and simple – but we don’t always take time to do it.

So, deep breaths friends, help is coming!

With compassion,

Dr. Amy

Hello Colleagues,

Wow. The past few weeks have been exhausting. Or, shall we say, even more exhausting? Between returning to school, vaccine mandates and staffing shortages, not to mention increased hospitalizations due to COVID, I know so many of you feel like you’re drowning.

You’re not alone.

Because you’re short on time and a lengthy email is the LAST thing you have time for right now, might I offer you a few reminders to address overwhelm?

1.     Get connected – on any level – in person, online, in a group, with your body, with an incredible friend. Connection is the NUMBER ONE factor that will address burnout.

2.     Breathe – it’s simple but effective. Research has shown that just 90 seconds of deep, belly breathing can reduce your cortisol levels. Take off your mask, find a space, and breathe deeply.

3.     Tap out – take a break, even if it’s for short periods of time. In 90 seconds you can breathe. In 5 minutes you can stretch. In 15 minutes you can eat a meal and try not to rush. In 30 minutes you can watch a sitcom and belly laugh. In an hour you dive into a creative task like knitting, singing, or drawing. In a half-day, you can go for a hike or visit a friend. In a day you can get out of town and disconnect from work. You get the picture…

4.     Feel your feelings – I know, you’ve stopped reading… “If I feel my feelings, I’ll go into a black hole and never come out.” It’s not true. Acknowledging feelings actually help them subside because they’re recognized. Once a feeling is recognized, you can decide what to do with it – cry? Set it aside for now? Write it down? Talk to someone? Run? Share it? That feeling needs to be felt all the way through, or it will pile up and come out in other spaces.

5.     Focus on what you can do now. You can’t solve the problem of yesterday and you cannot predict tomorrow (or even later today). But you can be present in the next moment with your patient, your colleague, your MA, or your partner. That’s the only moment we can control.

Gentle reminders friends. This is not an assignment, nor a task to achieve. It is how you will survive through this mess. Simply take an inventory of the ideas and choose one to be more intentional about during your day. Just one small action.

With compassion,

Dr. Amy