Shed the Shame

Let’s talk about it: shame. 

We’ve all experienced it, to various, debilitating degrees. For some, it’s the flush of humiliation when you realize that the toilet paper from the washroom stall followed you surreptitiously on the heels of your shoes, back to homeroom. For others, it’s the visceral discomfort of explaining an absent relationship with a sibling to a new acquaintance, or disclosing suicidal ideation in the emergency department. 

Sometimes, shame is reflected back to us through the eyes of our mothers, who try to make sense of a child they cannot understand. My mom tried to digest having a daughter choose to deprive herself of food in a land of abundance, relative opulence to the land from which she fled - a land ravaged by war, state-sanctioned starvation and heinous violence against women. Why? She asked, I could not provide a palatable answer, to her or myself. 

For years, I would step up to a microphone, on stages before crowds as intimate as ten or as sweeping as thousands, carrying with me all the stories of shame that I dared not breathe into words, all the iterations of myself that I deemed unworthy and unbecoming of a public figure. How would anyone respect me, I thought, if they knew that I struggled with restrictive eating and paralyzing anxiety in my late teens and early twenties? How could my patients follow my medical recommendations, knowing I had ravaged my own health in the first few months of my medical training? 

What I came to learn, in the process of writing my memoir - Unlike The Rest, A Doctor’s Story, is that when we give oxygen to the things that bring us shame, we begin to breathe easier. I wrote candidly, vulnerably about my experiences and recovery from disordered eating, unburdening myself of the shame in front of the world. The result? I was liberated, and felt that I had found the hidden key to unlock not only my joy, but my creative and innovative genius. 

When we recognize that shame is driven by false narratives of who we are as opposed to what we’ve experienced, or survived, we are then invited to step into the truth of our self worth and our power. Not only did shedding the shame I carried for years make me feel lighter and brighter, it improved my self-concept, enabled me to access a peace I had denied myself for years, and enhanced my confidence. Consequently, I felt more empowered, that I could unapologetically embrace my brilliance. The lasting outcome is a mind more willing to take creative risks without judgement, a stronger ability to critically analyze information, an enduring curiosity of the world, and a compassionate heart that holds space for others that are navigating the depths of their own trials. 

Shedding the shame has made me a better doctor, leader, mother, wife, daughter - and human, overall.