127. Part 2: How Physician Moms Can Thrive Without Self-Sacrifice

Hey Doc—

Welcome back to Part 2 of this conversation.

In Part 1, we talked about why so many physician moms end up exhausted, overwhelmed, and questioning whether this is simply what motherhood and medicine are supposed to feel like.

In this episode, we shift to what comes next.

We talk about the beliefs many of us carry into motherhood without ever examining them, why trying to do everything yourself often leads to resentment, and the practical shifts that allow physician moms to thrive without complete self-sacrifice.

From building a village to strengthening your marriage to putting yourself back on your own priority list, this conversation is about creating a version of motherhood that supports your life instead of consuming it.

In this episode, we discuss:

• Why you need to define motherhood based on your own values
• The myth that good mothers should do everything themselves
• How building a village creates stronger families, not weaker mothers
• Why investing in your marriage benefits everyone in your home
• How prioritizing yourself makes you a better physician, partner, and mother

Medicine teaches us to put everyone else first. Motherhood often reinforces the same message. It's no surprise so many physician moms feel like they're disappearing in the process.

My hope is that this conversation helps you think differently about what thriving can look like—and reminds you that you get to build a life that fits you.

🎧 Listen now, and if this episode made you think of another physician mom, send it her way.

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Transcript

   Hey, doc. I'm back with part two of my interview with the Girl Doc Survival Guide. And if you haven't listened to the first part, go back and listen to it first, and then come back to this one. This one is more focused on practical tools, things I use with my real coaching clients to stop feeling like you're failing at life and motherhood and medicine all together. It is a good one, so I hope you enjoy

Can you talk about the top five tools you give people so that they don't have to go through what you went through? Ooh, top five. Let's see The number one is to really think about where the ideas you have about motherhood come from, and then decide, does this make sense for my current life?

Does it really make sense for a physician who is a mother? It could only be what your definition is, not mine. A lot of people think that I want everybody to live my life. I really don't. I want you to live yours in alignment with your values. It has to start with you and your husband, if you are married, and what is right for your family.

Starting with reexamining that and moving forward, 'cause tools I can give, but if your definition of a good mom is, "I must do all the things, I must be at every event, I must cook all the meals," then you're not really going to be receptive to anything else. Not only can you not do it all alone, you were never supposed to.

That is a lie. That is something you are sold. It's not really good for any mother, but definitely not somebody who's been through what we've been through and who has already sacrificed as much as we have sacrificed. Having a village, and it could be paid or unpaid, is an essential part of motherhood and doesn't make you a failure.

So you decide which parts you wanna keep. The saying that I love is that you can delegate the work and keep the connection. You can delegate the work of motherhood and keep the connection with your children. So if that means cooking for your family is something you love and makes you feel full and whole, then do that.

But if you're like me and you hate cooking, then get somebody else to do it. Outsourcing, I'm very heavy on it, and usually getting support with childcare is where I focus, so much so that at one point people thought that I worked for au pair agencies. I'm like, "No, I don't." Just as physicians, it is one of the best forms of childcare because of the flexibility, the hours, and the cost.

Get the support where you can. The other one is to really focus on your marriage. You mentioned it's a lot of work, it's hard, and it will only be harder if it's an adversarial relationship or if it's just uneven, and it could be for a lot of reasons. It could be because y'all have fallen into traditional gender roles, and like you mentioned, you didn't even realize that you fell into it, 'cause that's what happens.

Unless somebody is intentionally teaching you, you're going to fall into what you know, which is from your home or from society, and that's just what it is. So the resentment that's there, realize that It's not doing you any favors and you're here, so what can we do to change the situation? Being really intentional about that because I'm one of those people where I think we should take care of ourselves and make sure we are happy and fulfilled and then take care of your marriage and then the children.

That doesn't fly with a lot of people because they're like, "Oh my gosh, no, my kids come first." But I really think that we should not only Put ourselves first because it's a cool thing to say and it's self-care, but realize that when you do care for yourself, when you do make sure that you're happy, everybody else benefits.

Everybody, including your children, including your patients. Like, I remember at the peak of my burnout, I was so unhappy, m- everybody could feel it, including my patients. So it's not just this selfish thing. Everybody that is around you is gonna benefit from you putting yourself first and caring for yourself.

I feel like I gave way more than five. Um, I was writing them down. Oh, okay. Um, one is examine what your true values are, what you think motherhood should look like for you. The second was you are never supposed to do it alone, so create a village, whether paid or unpaid, and that's success, actually. That's not failure to have a village.

Yes. And three, focus on marriage, especially if there's anything adversarial or uneven in your marriage. And four, take care of yourself first- Yes ... even though that's often contrary to what we've been taught as doctors, but also as women. 'Cause I feel I was taught in medicine overtly the patient comes first.

Definitely, yes. And yes, the patient should come first. It shouldn't be about me, the doctor when the patient- Right ... is acutely in need. Certainly the patient comes first, but the culture of medicine, I realize, is the patient always comes first, and that can't be true because- Right ... then we don't count as physicians.

We're human, too. We really are. Yes. I am first and foremost. I feel like a good example of how that's important is I spoke to a doc who was getting three hours of sleep. You can't take care of patients like that, right? That's like you being inebriated. So when I say take care of yourself and prioritize your sleep, it is for everyone, including your patients, and that's how you put them first, to make sure that you're okay.

So I do have a number five. Okay. And it is to trust yourself because we are also taught to second-guess ourselves. Everything you need is inside of you. Learn to trust that voice. Learn to just be okay with what you think is right because chances are it is. Be confident enough to stand on that and to speak it because you deserve that, to know that, yeah, my voice has value and I can speak it and I can trust myself.

Yeah. So definitely. I love that. When you said you give a lecture on redefining success for physician moms, can you give a little summary of that? How do you redefine success for physician moms? You deserve support and a village, and really accepting that Motherhood is not this isolated journey.

Recognizing that society and medicine shapes how we go through our motherhood journey, and then that shapes how our relationships at work go. Because if you are always in this self-sacrificial, give everything of yourself mode, there will literally be nothing left. I can't tell you how many times people have told me that, like, "I have nothing left to give."

So realizing that the way that you're currently going is not working, then starting with, "Okay, why do I even think this way? What is giving me these thoughts? Why did I come to the decision that this is what makes a good mom?" Recognize it, then decide, "Yeah, I'm gonna make a change, and then I'm going to redefine what that means for me."

If you are so overwhelmed, you're so drowning that you're like, "Okay, that sounds good, but I need childcare," get the help first. Getting the support before you do all this mindset work I feel is really essential, because A lot of people cannot even think straight. They can't see past the next day. They're just trying to survive.

So put the fire out before you rewire the house. That's a quote that I got when I did my perinatal mental health training. If somebody's in a psychological crisis, deal with the crisis first, and then worry about going back and figuring out why this happened and all of that. Getting the immediate support is essential.

That's why I talk so much about childcare, and why I talk so much about marriage as well, because a lot of the outsourcing can come right from the home. Recognizing that you may have some part to play in why you're not getting the support. Is it that your husband would help if you would let him? Is it that the perfectionism that causes us to be good doctors is causing problems at home and robbing you of the support that is right in front of you?

There are a lot of different ways that we can break out of that cycle and say, "Okay, for me, a good mom," I'll give my example, "is one that homeschools her son, is going to start homeschooling her daughter, and has an au pair that works full-time and does all the activities and all this stuff." She also cooks for them, because I don't cook.

And has a housekeeper, and outsources every single thing that is not loving my children and educating them. And that's what a good mom looks like to me, because I sat down and I realized I can't do it all. And when I tried, I ended up wanting to leave my kids. So really, if I don't like how I am right now, if I don't like how I'm feeling, if I'm not happy, what needs to change, and am I ready to make the change?

'Cause that's the biggest thing. You have to be ready. I love it. You've given your example. It sounds like your values in a successful motherhood is educating your kids, so you're homeschooling them. In terms of you were never supposed to do it alone, you have plenty of help for all the things you don't wanna do, like cooking, and you're still very connected to your kids.

In terms of focusing on your marriage, you guys did that with your trip to Cabo. There's no easy fix, I think you're also saying. Yeah. And take care of yourself first. You already mentioned it just starts with sleeping enough. Because I think the culture- Yes ... of medicine is people brag about when they haven't slept in two days.

It's, "Wow, you're a great doctor 'cause you haven't slept in two days." 'Cause you haven't slept in two days, your cognitive function is not- Right ... going to be as good. Like you said, it's like being drunk when we lose sleep. And then trust yourself. You have two coaches that also help you. Yes. And- Coaching mentor literally changed my life.

I don't generally mention this, but my coaching mentor is actually also my relationship coach. So we have this very unique relationship at this point. We've been working together for two years. She is a relationship coach, and she's been a physician coach way before it was a thing. So we worked together to grow my skills as a coach, and then my husband and I were like, "Oh, we need relationship coaching," and that's what she does.

So we had a thing with her, and then we went back to the mentorship. I have always had that support, and to me, coaching is another level of support for my village because my personal growth is very important to me and my husband. So that's one other way that I can expedite and outsource, right? 'Cause you can do personal growth on your own, but if you have a coach, it's a lot faster.

I wanted to talk about something you mentioned with the culture of medicine and the bragging about being sleep-deprived and pushing through. That's what residency teaches us. One of the goals of residency is to teach you to ignore your body, to ignore your health, to ignore any pain. How long can you hold your bladder while you're doing surgery, and all of these things.

People believe that is necessary for us to be good doctors. Those doctors haven't all retired yet, so it is something we have to actively work against because it's not just society. It is medicine as well. Yes, absolutely. Sad to say, this is only something I realized in the last, I would say, two or three years, how much- Yeah

the toxic culture of medicine

Has really influenced me in my life. It's not all bad in the sense that it's pushed me to achieve a lot of things- Yeah ... that maybe I wouldn't have had I been like, "I'm gonna prioritize sleeping- Right ... or a hobby." The culture of medicine is one thing, and then there's the capitalism of medicine. We are not the reasons that hospitals are going under and they can't hire more people, but we are the face of it.

Everybody's being funneled into limited resources, into limited residency spots. And I'm smart, sure, but it doesn't take a whole lot to figure out that we need more residency spots to then get doctors, so that's on the one end. And on the other end, to stop the burnout, to stop the people from leaving, and that's really focusing on physician wellbeing and not just, "Oh, let's have a wellness pizza party.

Let's go do some yoga," and ignoring the system that we're in. So I work on that side, right? Making sure that people can have sustainable careers, 'cause most of my clients are still working, and their goal is to be a doctor and be sustainable and make it, and not have to leave because they're burnt out.

The hospital systems need to shift the focus, or maybe they already do and that's where the whole capitalist thing comes in. But yeah, I won't go too much more into that. I, I fully agree with you. Right? Also, doctors are more likely to have fertility problems. It's another sacrifice that we are meant to make for medicine.

For the people that are like, "Okay, I'm not gonna wait," we then don't support them. If you're a resident, you only get six weeks, you may not be able to graduate on time. And if you're out, there are people who still get fired just for taking time off for maternity leave. Mm-hmm. Just for being a parent.

That's another sacrifice that we are asked to make, to delay fertility and hope that you won't have any problems. I don't think we are as far along with supporting physician parents as we think, and these stories are very much, like, under wraps because people are ashamed and because of NDAs. I had a client who was presented with an NDA when she got let go, and you don't give NDAs if everything's above board.

Her productivity was down because she had a baby. The entire system is not set up for reproductive-aged people, even though we are the ones that are becoming doctors and are expected to continue to work. So we have a lot to do. Yes. I'm so glad that you're in this space and helping physician moms and women physicians in general.

Do you have any final thoughts? Oh, I have so many thoughts. Just to reiterate my two main points is to trust yourself and take care of yourself as a right, as a human being, as a physician who has worked very hard to get to where you are. You deserve to be taken care of and to be trusted by yourself first, and that is you modeling for other people to trust you and to take care of you.

That was my mistake, that I was not modeling good self-care, so nobody else knew how to do it. They didn't know how to care for me because I didn't know how to care for myself. Yeah. So definitely do that, doc. Okay, that's awesome. Dr. Toya, you're amazing. Oh, thank you. I'm so glad that I got to speak to you.

This was very fun. Thank you so much.

 I hope you enjoyed that conversation as much as I have. And I realize that I've done a lot of interviews like this that are really good. So I'm going to be sharing more of them with you because why keep a good thing secret, you know? Sharing is caring. So be sure to share this episode with another physician mom who just needs some solidarity and some real practical advice to get her through. She would greatly appreciate it. You don't know how sharing something so simple can really change somebody's life. It could just reach her at the very right time, the time where she was about to break, and this could be the thing that helps her. So be sure to share, be sure to rate and review. All of those things help us reach more physician moms just like you.

All right, doc, I'll see you on the next one