I knew I wanted to be a pharmacist when I was in 10th grade.

I shadowed a community pharmacist at a local drug store in Franklin, Pennsylvania, and something clicked. The way he showed up for his community. The conversations. The trust. I thought — that's what I want to do for the next 30 years.

Fast forward through pharmacy school at LECOM, through the white coat ceremony, through raising my right hand and meaning every single word of that oath — and what I found on the other side was... not that.

What I found was a system that said: stay in your lane, fill the prescription, bill the insurance, dispense the product. Stay in the box.

I had 8 different pharmacy jobs over 15 years. Retail. Floating. Independent. Long-term care. Consulting. MTM. Hospital. Administration.

You know what they all had in common?

I was spending 1% of my day doing actual patient care.

One percent.

The other 99% was metrics, volume, dispensing. Important work — but not the work I was trained to do. Not the work that oath promised me I'd get to do.

We were taught motivational interviewing. Behavioral modification. How to write SOAP notes. How to show up as a multidisciplinary team member.

And then we graduated and were told: here's your counter. Here's your queue. Don't leave the box.

Pharmacists aren't leaving pharmacy because they're weak. They're leaving because they can't do what they were educated to do. They'd rather be travel agents and real estate agents than spend another decade asking "do you want a consultation with that?"

I thought I was the problem. For 15 years, I thought I was broken.

I wasn't broken. The model was.

And that realization changed everything.

This week on The Dose, I tell the full story — from 10th grade to the moment it all shifted. If you've ever wondered whether pharmacy has more for you than what you're doing right now, this episode is for you.

🎧 Listen to Episode 1 of The Dose on Substack

—Thea