Make time for Self-Care

 Instance 1:

“After the second wave, I actually had hormonal disturbances and my blood glucose levels were high,” said the barely-thirty-year-old doctor. “I worked for six months on only three to four hours of sleep, without even a single holiday. I need not have done it, but I chose to do it as there was nobody else to take on the responsibility.” The doctor continued, with pride clearly reflecting on her face.

Instance 2:

“We tried to get in touch with you several times last week. Your phone was not reachable.” The accusatory tone had my hackles rising.

“That is because I was on planned leave, and everybody who needed to know already knew. There were alternate arrangements in place.”

“But you should have at least provided a number where we could contact you.”

“If that is the case then what is the point of me taking time off?”

Instance 3:

She sneaked into my cabin with a guilty look on her face. I knew she had gone to have a cup of coffee and was thoroughly perplexed by the look on her face.

“What’s the matter?” I asked.

“Sorry madam, I should have come back ten minutes ago. But the technician from the other department was unusually chatty today.”

I was honestly at a loss for words.

Instance 4

“I shall be on leave for one and half day on ____ and ____ dates. However, I shall be available on my phone day or night 24x7.” Read the email.

My eyes popped out on reading it. The sense of self-righteousness was coming off in waves, even in the written form.

Instance 5

“I noticed some changes to the leave policy,” I said to a colleague of mine. “Have they reduced the paid leaves from 30 to 24? Can they do that?”

I was new there and one of the reasons I had joined the organisation was because of the number of paid leaves one could take per year.

“Yeah. It seems they have changed the policy. But it hardly matters, does it? A dozen or so of my leaves lapse every year!”

I wish I could say that these instances are all fictional, but they have happened more times than I care to count. As medical professionals in a country like India, it is drummed into us that we can never take time off, never go on a peaceful holiday without getting phone calls from work, and never make time for self-care. Cultivating hobbies and indulging in them is a borderline sin.

Conversely, it is a matter of pride to be available 24x7x365, for any and every kind of silly thing. We carry on day in and day out, feeling guilty every time we take time off or do anything other than work. In the process, we wreck our physical health and oftentimes, even mental health.

There might be super humans who can do unlimited amount of work, find time to exercise, find time for their families, and do whatever they want to do without ever been fazed. But not everybody wants to live that way. In a country where human resources are our biggest asset, we continue to overburden the few without making any changes to the toxic system.

We are burning out earlier and earlier; and we find ourselves praying for physical ill-health so that we get some guilt-free time off work, in order to preserve our mental well-being. The government healthcare sector is filled with apathy, whereas the bottom line dictates the attitude of the private healthcare sector.

‘If I do it, everyone needs to do it’ attitude needs to change. Come on now, be honest with yourself—would you still do it if there was an alternative?