I built my career on caring, compassion, and a deep desire to help others.

As a psychiatric nurse practitioner with a doctorate, I was trained to understand suffering: to listen closely, recognize patterns, and validate experiences that others might overlook. That work wasn’t just professional. It was personal. Long before I became a clinician, I was a patient.

I have lived with symptoms for most of my life. But like many patients, I was told to push through. To try harder. To keep going. When answers were unclear, the explanation often shifted back onto me: stress, anxiety, resilience, mindset. I internalized that.

And I carried it with me into my career. It shaped the kind of clinician I became. I listened longer. I looked deeper. I made sure my patients felt believed in ways I hadn’t always been. My empathy wasn’t just learned; it was lived. What I didn’t realize was that compassion, insight, and work ethic would not protect me from the same system.

As my symptoms worsened, I did what I had always been taught to do. I pushed harder. Through fatigue. Through pain. Through cognitive strain that made even routine tasks more difficult. I adapted where I could and compensated where I couldn’t. Because in this profession, that’s what we do. We keep showing up.

Until we can’t.

There came a point where I was no longer able to be consistently present for my patients. Calling off work because of the severity of my symptoms was not a decision I took lightly; it felt like I was letting them down. But continuing to push through, when I could not safely or effectively function, would have been a different kind of harm. That tension, between wanting to show up and recognizing that I could not, was one of the most difficult parts of this process.

I was ultimately diagnosed at the Mayo Clinic with myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia, in addition to a prior diagnosis of psoriatic arthritis. Objective evaluation. Specialist confirmation. Clear documentation.

And still, I was questioned.

When I finally reached the point where continuing clinical work was no longer sustainable, I expected that my medical training, my documentation, and my understanding of illness would matter. Instead, I found myself back in a familiar position. Despite evidence, despite years of education and clinical experience, I encountered doubt, sometimes subtle, sometimes explicit.

“Are you sure this isn’t psychological?”

“Could this be burnout?”

“Maybe this isn’t the right career for you.”

There is a particular kind of harm in being dismissed by your own professional community. Especially when you have spent your career doing the opposite for others. Empathy did not protect me. Understanding did not protect me. Working harder did not protect me. And by the time I could no longer sustain the demands of my role, the consequences were not just professional; they were financial.

Chronic illness does not just take your health; it erodes financial stability. Even when supports are available, they are limited. Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) protections and short-term disability (STD), if you are fortunate enough to have access to them, are finite. They are quickly exhausted in the context of chronic, unpredictable illness.

Long-term disability (LTD), while often presented as a safety net, can be difficult to access or maintain in practice. Policy limitations, restrictive definitions, and administrative barriers can leave clinicians without meaningful support when they need it most. Savings are depleted. Retirement plans are disrupted. The cost of care rises as income falls.

You are left in a space that feels impossible: too ill to work as you once did, but not adequately supported to stop. That reality is not just stressful; it is destabilizing.

At the same time, you are faced with decisions that feel both practical and deeply personal: Do I continue to renew licenses and certifications I may not be able to use? Do I invest limited energy and resources into maintaining a professional identity I can no longer fully inhabit? Or do I let them lapse, and accept what that represents? Because letting go is not just administrative. It is symbolic.

This profession asks clinicians to give everything: to show up fully, to push through, to prioritize patient care even at personal cost. What it does not do well is care for clinicians when they can no longer do that. It is not built to support us when we become patients. And it is especially not built to believe us when our illness does not fit expectations.

I am still navigating this reality. Still managing my health. Still questioning my place in a profession I once saw as a lifelong calling. Still trying to reconcile the gap between what I know as a clinician and what I am experiencing as a patient. And perhaps one of the most difficult parts is the uncertainty. The unknown future, financially, professionally, and physically, is not just abstract. It is something I live with daily. It is unsettling, unpredictable, and at times deeply frightening.

But I also know this: there are clinicians who have always been pushing through, long before anyone noticed. Clinicians whose compassion comes from lived experience, not just training. Clinicians who built their careers on caring for others, and still found themselves unsupported when they needed care most.

We talk about compassion in health care. We need to start extending it to clinicians, too.

Jamie Lynn Bagley is a nurse practitioner.