Comfort

I have tended to be a very cooperative physician, unlike many cardiologists. This feels good to me because I feel respectful of the patient. And frankly, most of my patients love it MOST of the time. But there are times my patients want to be "told" what to do--and sometimes it feels a bit uncomfortable for me. Now comes the horse part...horses that are "bossy" are comforting to the other horses--it means that they will be taken care of. So I have recently been stretching my usual patterns and become more "bossy", especially as it regards lifestyle changes. It seems patients need to be able to say to others, something on the order of "MY doctor wants me to exercise every day", or "I'm on this diet plan because my doctor wants (demands) it this way"--in other words, it seems to be comforting to them to have me a be somewhat demanding or bossy in this regard. When I'm on the trail with one of my horses, they feel comforted when I sit tall and ready to help them through any unfamiliar obstacle. So while I still don't want "bossy" to become part of my dominant personality characteristics, I now see where some variant of this quality can be comforting to patients and effective in eliciting necessary change.