This Is Going To Hurt came to my attention a good few months ago now, and i had absolutely no idea what to think about it. I knew it was an honest account of working in the NHS from a Junior Doctors point of view, but i knew very little about Adam Kay and honestly didn’t know what to expect from the book. A lot of people were encouraging me to pick this up, even though it’s a little out of my comfort zone, and i’m so incredibly glad i did.
The book came from Adam’s diaries that he kept during his time working in the NHS. It’s something that i’ve always been interested in. In no way would i be able to work as a part of the NHS, i knew that long before now, i simply don’t have the stamina, but i am truly amazed by people who stick to their jobs as doctors and sacrifice a lot of their life to do it. I knew i’d be interested in this book if i picked it up.
However, i didn’t know going in to it that the book is practically made up of Adam’s diaries. I knew it would be some accounts of his work, however it really is just made up of diary entries. I really loved that about this book, it had short sections that you could pick up and put down when you pleased, but honestly i found it incredibly addictive.
Another thing i didn’t expect was how funny the book would be. Admittedly in a lot of parts it’s awfully tragic, and it does depict how horrifying and heartbreaking working in medicine can be. But Adam tries to inject some classic British humour in to his book and makes jokes about what was stuck where and stupid things that people might have said to him. It had me laughing out loud on more than one occasion.
As i’ve mentioned before, it also is horrifically tragic. There are many points when you realise that Adam is recalling not having slept properly in days or missing another one of his life events for work. It makes you think about the lives that people in these jobs lead and how difficult it is for them. Especially when he talks about the loss of a patient or something going wrong at work. It’s unimaginable. I found it really hard to read at times, but incredibly telling of what the current situation is in the U.K.
I have a lot of respect for Adam for writing this book and bringing his thoughts together. I listened to it on audiobook where Adam narrates it himself. There was something special about listening to him read his own stories from his time in the NHS and it gave a true, dry British humour to something that in reality is completely unamusing.
I genuinely don’t have a bad word to say about This Is Going To Hurt. I really would love to pick up my own physical copy and i urge everyone to do the same.
The Little Contemporary Corner 