1/10 It’s #SuicidePreventionMonth and we #healthcare workers must take a moment to stop and take stock because depression and suicide are occupational hazards, particularly in this exceptionally difficult year of #Covid_19.

2/10 Six years ago, I was an internal medicine intern in a dark place. You wouldn’t have known it from the outside because I wore cheery bow ties and smiled broadly.

3/10 Internally, I felt like a failure and found proof of that daily when I goofed up while ordering labs or didn’t have the wealth of knowledge to answer the questions that my brilliant residents asked me.

4/10 In those days of exhaustion and self-doubt, every cutting comment and every little error sent me plunging into disturbing thoughts. I think every health care provider has been there.

5/10 But I pretended that this was normal and that I “got it” and could “handle it.” I aimed to embody #Osler’s Aequanimitas.

6/10 Life didn't feel sustainable until I had dinner with my brilliant, accomplished, and kind friend and co-intern @sandeep_kishore who ended much of inner turmoil with three words: “Dude, me too.” https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/05/opinion/why-do-doctors-commit-suicide.html

7/10 My illusion that I was the only one struggling vanished and I stoped seeing errors as humiliations. I saw them as learning opportunities. It transformed the following months of my intern year.

8/10 Pretending that we have emotional or physical prowess beyond what we actually possess is a widely prevalent flavor of machismo in medicine. We must embrace a culture of acknowledging vulnerabilities. My program director @MarkDSiegel1 made it easy to do this.

9/10 So next time you see a colleague struggling with something that you’ve also grappled with, use @sandeep_kishore's magic words: “Dude, me too!”

10/10 The cornerstone of our profession is kindness. Let’s save a bit of that for ourselves and for our colleagues. @nhochMD @LaurenPischel @colleenmfarrell @LisaSandersmd @annareisman @BenjaminLinas @Tracy_Rabin @jabarocas @anneliu_md @YaleIMed @id_bmc @GoldFdtn @Armstrws