Women in Medicine: Natalie Solomon, PsyD, DBSM

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

As a child, on the way to school, we passed the same traffic director daily. One day, the traffic director approached my mother to return her hubcap. Unbeknownst to her, it had fallen off and the traffic director, who had recognized it as my mother's, wanted to return it. I was enamored and decided I wanted to become a traffic director because I, like him, wanted to make people feel cared for.

I wanted to be a traffic director, a monk, a poet, or a doctor and in a way I feel like I get to be all four.

Share a memorable experience or accomplishment you are proud of in your career. How did it impact your journey?

I worked with a patient as his memory was waning. At the end of treatment, he wrote a letter to himself about his gains. We agreed that I would periodically mail him copies of his own letter over the coming year. Every time I walked to the mail room to send out a copy, I felt like there was a balloon in my chest. It is such an honor to learn about another’s inner world.