Dear Doctor, please pause and take a breath outside the door.

It’s good for both of us.

I know the system you work in demands too much, too fast, for too little. It rewards efficiency over empathy, billing codes over presence. It’s not your fault, but it’s also not okay. You’re working inside a system designed for extraction and monetization, not human well-being. It wears you down, and when you’re worn down, your dysregulation spills over onto the people who need your care the most.

I’ve experienced this more times than I can count.

One doctor burst through the door without knocking. He was out of breath, sweating, and highly activated, all cues of danger. My body reacted before my mind could catch up. I dissociated immediately. Another time, a doctor walked toward me and began touching me without saying what he was going to do or asking if it was okay. I froze and then dissociated. And then there was the plastic surgeon who robotically pushed aggressive reconstructive surgery after skin cancer removal. It was such a hard sell and so disconnected from humanity that he seemed animatronic. When I left that office, I experienced derealization. It felt like I was in a movie or on another planet.

This is the kind of thing dysregulated and disconnected doctors do to us. Unintentionally, yes, but still harmfully. It’s not okay.

From an Interpersonal Neurobiology (IPNB) perspective, it matters how nervous systems interact. When a doctor is rushed, tense, disconnected, or on autopilot, the patient’s nervous system picks that up instantly. Our bodies read cues of safety or danger before our minds make sense of them. And if your cues signal threat, even unintentionally, our bodies go into defense: fight, flight, freeze, or dissociate. Healing can’t happen there.

But it doesn’t have to be that way.

If you paused, just for a few seconds, outside the door… and breathed… your own system could shift out of stress physiology into regulation. That simple act changes everything. You bring coherence into the room. You help your patient’s nervous system find safety through yours. You create the possibility of a real, human encounter instead of another procedural transaction.

The pause doesn’t fix the system, but it can protect you from the chronic wear and tear of it. It can protect us both. By taking those tiny moments–breathing, grounding, and being present–we can lessen the grip of corporate greed and reclaim what medicine was meant to be: a profoundly healing relationship between two human beings.

So, dear doctor, please, pause and take a breath outside the door.

It’s good for both of us.