After two years of trying to mould your life so that it satisfies a small panel of administrators, after five years of gruelling assessments, you can, at last, call yourself a doctor—an underpaid, overworked junior doctor, however. What about your friends and families, what about your life outside medicine? For one side to excel, the other must fall.

As a medic you see things that you've never seen before—new life, old death, physical decay, and spiritual resolve. You see things that elevate your mood and others that send it to the darkest abyss. How can you cope?

To survive as a doctor, you have to preserve your ability to think. To think objectively don't you have to cast off your emotions? For the sake of professionalism, yes, you do. But how do you switch from an unfeeling doctor who fakes compassion so well to a normal human who feels it?

Why do we do it? Why do we put ourselves under so much stress? We know it's not for money—we could do much less to receive much more. So why do we do it?

Is it for charity? To put everyone before you, to save hundreds of lives by letting your own spirit crumble? Is it worth it; does the satisfaction we get from this make up for the self sacrifice? In a perfect system we would say, “Yes, the tradeoff is fair, the result is dazzling.”

But we do not live in a perfect system: medicine like so many other things is a business, a profession, not an act of altruism. There are books to balance and standards to maintain. Just as the child pulls the strings of the puppets, governments and accountants guide a surgeon's scalpel. They tell us to deny treatment, to dismiss some in favour of others. They stain a doctor's magnanimity with the red ink of the balance books.

Doctors are accused by some of playing God, trying to ward off death for a few more moments. Doctors are not gods, however, they are humans, and all humans make mistakes. Nobody is perfect, but perfection is required for the job. Every tiny slip is seized as a scandal, good doctors are hauled into court to be sued, to have their practice threatened, and to have their dignity dashed.

So what does being a doctor in today's society mean? Let us recap: physical exhaustion, mental strain, financial difficulty, mental anesthesia, legal disputes, and so on. I do hope there are people out there who can put up with this life of self destruction—for me, however, the nightmare is over, once and for all.

What makes a medical doctor in this world that is guided by profit seekers (Business men) and the "wanna be famous" (politicians)? I am not sure. But I think Suneet has it all right in her article "Leaving Medicine". I see it happen, children die just because the bill couldn't be paid while the policy is loud and clear " No treatment unless you pay." It is the payment that makes my salary. With that stamped in my pay cheque I can't have room for compassion and I just have to turn a patient away in the name of professionalism.

A doctor should be a patriot in saving lives (that is what hippocratic oath says). How is that possible when you have strings attached from all corners, I mean the tax has to be paid, insurance, you have to eat, sleep, and the list goes on?

In the end of the day we trully are in "physical exhaustion, mental strain,financial difficulty, mental anesthisia,legal disputes and so on."

Yes we are overworked and underpaid, especially in my part of the world. But when you see children dying, a nation being swept away while there is knowledge to save this nation and earn that sense of satisfaction for having done that. Then you see the worth of standing amidst it all.

Last year I watched my mother die and then my niece. I have no idea what went wrong simply because there was no Doctor to tell me. And then I realised how important one person could be to another, what difference one can make. And My will to become a doctor grew stronger than ever, not because of the deaths. But because I want to be there for someone else, someone who needs my knowledge. This should answer Suneet's question of why I do it!

In this developing nation that I am in, I am more appreciated for trying than am I sued for a mistake. For as long as it remains such... I shall keep trying and try harder to avoid mistakes. I shall not do what is beyond my ability and I shall certainly not play God.

With this little vow I have made to myself, medicine shall not be a tool for "self destruction" but away to self realisation.

I think this again sparks off the now-long-debated issue or rather I would say the internal mental conflict of most medics. The initial 1 or 2 years in Med School are spent in trying to cope up with the schedules trying to bridge the gap between what is taught and what is learnt. It is only later that one realises how different the world is in a medical college and the sooner one understand sand accepts this fact the better it is for both one's own self as well as the profession. We have to understand that this profession is different from any other 9 to 5 job.

To be able to sustain oneself and keep going there has to be motivation from inside as is visible from Fatma's letter. Despite the realisation that doctors are human too and there's a fallibility attached to all humans the fact remains that society does place doctors in high esteem which is perhaps the most satisfying reward for all the labour and mental struggle that goes into the making of a doctor. After all that they see and have gone through and realising how little they can do sometimes to prevent a fate that nature has decided i don't think it is in the capacity of any doctor to even think of playing God.

Still i would say - to each his own and i believe that Suneet is very honest in identifying what clearly is his innate wish.

I can sense a feeling of frustration in your voice Suneet. I would like to show you the picture in a different perspective. As you have mentioned self-destruction and Fatma self-realisation there will be some self- for everyone, which motivates him or her to become a doctor. As different people have different goals like charity for some, passion for some and money for some. Everyone has some reason to do so but in your case I see that you are unable to find a reason. If you could get an answer for that I am sure you will reconsider your decision of leaving a ‘noble’ profession.

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