How Do You Feel?: One Doctor's Search for Humanity in Medicine

by Jessi Gold

Overview

A “thought-provoking exploration of healing and compassion in the face of adversity” (Jen Gunter, MD, New York Times bestselling author of The Menopause Manifesto) following one psychiatrist and four of her patients as they deal with the unspoken physical and mental health costs of caregiving—perfect for fans of Maybe You Should Talk to Someone and The In-Between.

In How Do You Feel? Dr. Jessi Gold offers a deeply personal and poignant memoir that explores the hidden tolls of taking care of others. As an assistant professor, practicing psychiatrist, and university wellness leader, Dr. Gold was accustomed to a life of constant busyness, always putting the needs of her patients, colleagues, and loved ones before her own. But when an unthinkable error during a patient session forces her to confront her own mental health, she begins a journey of self-discovery and reevaluation of the medical system that trained her.

Through the eyes of her health care worker patients—a resident with OCD, a pregnant nurse with PTSD, an aspiring medical student with crippling test anxiety, and an overwhelmed ER physician—Dr. Gold examines the pervasive issues of burnout, perfectionism, and the emotional burden of working in health care. These compelling narratives, combined with her own personal therapy sessions, reveal the shared struggles of maintaining humanity in a field dedicated to serving others.

Expertly weaving her research expertise with unforgettable stories and raw emotions, Dr. Gold’s memoir is at once deeply personal and utterly universal. How Do You Feel? demonstrates the unbridled capacity for connection, learning, and growth, reminding us all that in order to care for others, we must first remember to care for ourselves. This book is a must-read for anyone in the caregiving profession or for those who want to understand the profound impact of mental health on our lives.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781982199777
Publisher:	S&S/Simon Element
Publication date:	10/08/2024
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	54,385
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Psychiatrist Jessi Gold, MD, MS, is the Chief Wellness Officer of the University of Tennessee System and an associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center. She is a fierce mental health advocate and highly sought-after expert in the media on everything from burnout to celebrity self-disclosure. Dr. Gold has written widely for the popular press, including for The New York Times, The Atlantic, InStyle, Slate, and Self. In her clinical practice, she sees health care workers, trainees, and young adults in college. A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania (with a degree in anthropology), the Yale School of Medicine, and the Stanford University Department of Psychiatry, she spends her free time traveling with her friends, watching live music (especially Taylor Swift) or mindless television, and on walks with her dog, Winnie. Find her on X, Instagram, TikTok, or Threads @DrJessiGold.

Editorial Reviews

11/11/2024

Psychiatrist Gold discusses how she neglected her own mental health while caring for others at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in her touching and raw debut. Long considered a close listener and empathetic friend, Gold found psychiatric medicine a natural fit. Over the years, however, she came to realize that her focus on others was “as much a way to distract myself from my own feelings and struggles as... an act of selflessness and meaning.” She traces her journey toward better self-care and more stable mental health while providing a behind-the-curtain peek at the life of a therapist, sharing how she and her colleagues stay alert on off days and highlighting her work with several clients during the pandemic, including a medical resident who obsessively worried that he’d contract Covid and a nurse scarred by the death of one of her patients. Candidly illustrating both the hard work of talk therapy and the toll it can take on practitioners, Gold admirably exposes her own failings (she was late to several Zoom meetings and called patients by the wrong names during the peak of the pandemic). It’s an eye-opener. Agent: Kristin van Ogtrop, InkWell Management. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

If you’ve ever said “I’m fine” when you weren’t. If you’ve ever been so many things to so many people that you became unavailable to yourself. If you’ve ever believed you were too much, not nearly enough, or somehow, inexplicably, both at once. This book is for you. For us. Jessi Gold’s How Do You Feel? is one of the most human, most reassuring books I’ve ever read about the intersection of mental health, work, medicine, and culture. What a gift.” —Maggie Smith, New York Times bestselling author of You Could Make This Place Beautiful

“This book will make you laugh, marvel, reflect and grow. Most of all, it will make you feel seen. Whether you’re a healthcare worker, someone who loves one, someone who sees one, or someone who is struggling, Dr. Jessi Gold’s words — and the many intimate stories here, including her own — will be a balm and a guide.” —Lucy Kalanithi, MD, Clinical associate Professor of medicine, Stanford university, and widow of Dr. Paul Kalanithi, author of When Breath Becomes Air

"In How Do You Feel, Dr. Gold manages the seemingly impossible. She gently brings healthcare workers into conversation with our sometimes complicated inner worlds, and does this with wisdom, humor and candor. She lovingly nudges us to awareness and acknowledgement of the immense emotional load we’ve carried and holds space for our collective reflection. Ultimately she calls on us to do the most radical thing imaginable: to care for ourselves even as we care for others. A true game-changer, moving conversations about caregiver mental health into an exciting, new and generative space." —Rana Awdish, MS MD Author of In Shock

From the Publisher