From Pandemic Hero to Burnout and Back
Sometimes, I don’t want to talk about work, but it’s everywhere. I fell in love with public health a long time ago—before it became a buzzword. I was excited, passionate, and driven to help people. In undergrad, I created canned programs based on needs assessments done in the community. I engaged with stakeholders, built partnerships, and developed initiatives before the world changed in 2019/2020.
I was leading efforts to combat a “mysterious virus in Wuhan…” My life felt like one of those end-of-the-world movies where a public health professional saves the day. THAT was how I envisioned my career—I was LITERALLY saving the world. But I had no idea just how political public health was until I was in it.
As a contact tracer, people hung up on me.
“How did you get my data?!”
When I shared public health campaigns, I was attacked online.
“Do NOT listen to her! She works for the CDC Foundation!”
When I worked in immunizations, the community told me:
“The COVID-19 vaccine is the mark of the beast!”
And after all of that, I stayed.
I transitioned to the cancer space, but there was no excitement. No mutated cancer spreading at pandemic levels. No day-to-day changes in guidance from infectious disease experts. And for the first time, I wasn’t the one bringing in the latest insights. I thought I could handle that.
I couldn’t.
I chased the next big thing for years—until I got my wake-up call in a toxic government job. A job that paid me $20K less than I made in the cancer space. A job in food insecurity that gave me a different type of excitement:
Anxiety. Isolation. Gaslighting. Racism. Lying. Manipulation.
It made me question everything. Made me want to beg for my old job back and tell my former supervisor I was wrong. But I see it now—that was God telling me to stop chasing, to SIT DOWN.
I left that nightmare in November 2024. I accepted my offer just as the new administration was announced as the presidential winner of the 2025 election.
Now, I’m in the private sector. I’m making more than I ever did at one job, even more than in the cancer space. It’s hybrid. I can’t get bored because every day brings something new.
But one day, I will return to infectious disease. I still want to be THAT important. When the world is crumbling, I want to be the one saving the day.