Imposter syndrome is a relatively new concept to me - in that I knew I felt it every now and then but I never knew what to call it until about a 3 or so years ago.

I’ve been in EMS for a while now. 8 years total 4 of them being a paramedic. This isn’t to gloat but I do feel that I am a good paramedic. I am compassionate, I’m proactive as a opposed to reactive and I’ve received accommodations from leadership as well as recommendations from physicians to back that.

The kicker is, EMS is all I’ve done for my adult life. I’ve had a few other jobs when I was a teenager and a few random ones here and there for extra cash but my full time job has always been EMS. So, at 26 years old (it was much worse when I was a new medic) and as someone who didn’t do particularly well in high school and whose personal life is chaotic to say the least - I sit down and I think to myself, “Holy shit, is this really my job? People really trust me with all of this?”

I still make mistakes, I’m most certainly not without faults and I’m definitely familiar with humility. That’s when it hits the hardest though. It masks itself behind the cool low incident, high acuity skills. It stays waiting behind the code stroke whose BGL is 30 and you missed it. It watches as you don’t treat the symptomatic heart rate of 180 because the patient’s work of breathing was so bad that you were convinced that was the cause of the elevated heart rate despite being the other way around.

Thats when I feel it the most. When I miss things I shouldn’t miss. When I get tunnel vision because it’s 2am and I’m hungry. Although I love a good learning opportunity, it’s hard when you’re kicking yourself in the ass - asking yourself if you’re really even meant to do this job.

I guess to wrap this up, those moments are easily forgotten about when a call goes textbook perfect and you return to service feeling like you truly made a difference on that one.

I’m just curious what everyone else’s experiences are with this and if anyone has a good self reflection story they want to share.