Partnering Well: Boundaries, Money, and Healthy Relationships for Women in Medicine
MD, MHPE, FACEP
What does it actually mean to partner well, especially as a woman in medicine?
In this Valentine’s Day episode of Heartline: Changemaking in Healthcare, Dr. Andrea Austin shares a short chapter from her book on partnering well after divorce. She reflects on boundaries, money, self-worth, and building a healthy, lasting relationship as a woman in medicine.
Drawing from personal experience, Andrea explores how insecurity and self-sabotage can show up in relationships, why liking your partner matters as much as loving them, and how true partnership supports growth without self-erasure.
This episode offers practical reflection for physicians and professionals navigating relationships, marriage, or personal healing.
You’ll hear how Andrea:
• Defines “partnering well” after divorce and personal healing
• Explores boundaries in relationships, including money and autonomy
• Shares how insecurity can lead to self-sabotage—and how to interrupt it
• Discusses why liking your partner matters as much as loving them
• Challenges the belief that healthy relationships should feel hard
• Offers reflection questions to strengthen current or future connections
If you’re navigating relationships as a physician or professional, healing after heartbreak, or reimagining what partnership can look like, this episode offers clarity, warmth, and reassurance—right on time for Valentine’s Day.
📚 Resources + Mentions
• Book: Revitalized: A Guidebook to Following Your Healing Heartline (https://www.amazon.com/Revitalized-Guidebook-Following-Healing-Heartline/dp/B0DFVPB33N) (available on Audible)🔑 Top 3 Key Takeaways
• Boundaries create safety, not distance: Clear boundaries, especially around communication and money, allow intimacy to grow.
• Love isn’t enough without mutual respect and enjoyment: A healthy partnership includes genuinely liking your partner and enjoying life together.
• Growth should never require self-erasure: The best relationships support your evolution without asking you to abandon who you are.
🩺 About the Host:
Dr. Andrea Austin is a board-certified emergency physician, educator, and passionate advocate for system-level change in healthcare. As the creator and host of Heartline: Changemaking in Healthcare, Dr. Austin brings curiosity, compassion, and bold honesty to conversations with leaders who are challenging the norms and reshaping medicine from the inside out.
With decades of experience in high-pressure clinical environments, Andrea has seen firsthand the cracks in the system—and the people working to repair them. Whether she’s mentoring residents, speaking on national stages, or recording with a fellow disruptor, she centers one theme: change doesn’t happen in isolation. It happens heart to heart.
💫 About the Show:
Heartline: Changemaking in Healthcare isn’t just a podcast—it’s a pulse check on what’s possible.
Hosted by emergency physician and educator Dr. Andrea Austin, Heartline features conversations with healthcare leaders, innovators, and quiet disruptors who are challenging the way things have always been done.
Each episode explores real stories of change—from redefining leadership and communication, to reimagining systems built on burnout and hierarchy. This is a space for truth-telling, for asking better questions, and for reconnecting with the reason we all got into medicine in the first place: to make it better.
This isn’t about perfection. It’s about progress—with heart.
Follow Your Heartline and transform healthcare today!
🎓 Upcoming Events & Opportunities
• 🔥 Recalibrate (https://www.coachingfordoctors.net.au/programs/recalibrate-doctor-care/) : Group Coaching for Physicians
Starting 2026, I’ll be co-leading Recalibrate with psychologist and coach Sharee Johnson. This 6-month group coaching program supports physicians in rediscovering mindfulness, meaning, and wholehearted practice. I’m an alum myself—this program transformed my career. Learn more and enroll here, and please share with colleagues who may benefit.
• AAWEP (https://www.acep.org/aawep/) St. Lucia Retreat | March 5–8, 2026
• For women EM physicians. Sun, connection, and reflection in a stunning setting.
• Heart of Medicine in Uluru, Australia (https://learn.coachingfordoctors.net.au/theheartofmedicine)
o Join us for this incredible one of a one-of-a-kind event in the heart of Australia at one of our most spectacular locations—Voyagers Resort in Central Australia in 2026.
o Learn from some of the world’s medical leaders in compassionate care, and how heart-centered healthcare can empower and heal healthcare workers and their patients.
o For: Doctors, Nurses, Allied Health Clinicians, Healthcare Leaders,
Coaches and Supervisors of Medics, Patient Advocates and all healthcare workers.
o When: 29-31 July 2026
Where: Voyages Ayers Rock Resort, Central Australia
• Women in Medicine …
Full Transcript
Podcast Introduction and Valentineu2019s Day Message 0:00
Welcome to Heartline, Changemaking in Healthcare. I'm your host, Dr. Andrea Austin, a board-certified emergency physician, physician development coach, and educator. After years on the front lines, I've learned that real change in healthcare starts within. Each episode invites you to explore the inner work that unlocks clarity and bold leadership, because healing systems through changemaking begins with following our heartlines. Hi, Changemakers. Happy Valentine's Day. And I know I read a recent chapter about divorce and I'm happily married.
So on this Valentine's Day, I want to dedicate this episode to my wonderful husband, Chris, and I'm going to share Very short chapter from the book. And if you're enjoying listening to me read the book, I would suggest hopping over to Audible and you can download the entire book. So I hope you've enjoyed as we've taken a break from recording some episodes and I've taken some time to read. some of the chapters from the book. So on that note, happy Galentine's Day and happy Valentine's Day to wherever you are in your love journey, because at the end of the day, the most important person for you to love is to love yourself.
And if nobody's told you that today, I love you and I love that you're listening to this podcast. So here we go, partnering well. I've been out of the dating game a long time. My only advice is that if you're hustling for love, you better hustle right out of that relationship.
Partnering Well and Building Healthy Boundaries 1:32
That's a quote from me on February 14th from 2024. Following my divorce in medical school, I told myself I would never get married again. Yet within a few years, I fell in love with my current husband, Chris. When I left my first marriage, I developed a long list of things I would not tolerate in a relationship. While I didn't have the word boundaries in my vocabulary effectively, I had developed critical boundaries that would keep me safe in future relationships. Chris is not perfect. Sometimes when looking for a partner, we get caught up in finding the ideal person.
The key to our marriage has been growing. We are far from the same people that we were when we met. We navigate each other's changing interests and needs. The Gottmans are two married relationship experts who discuss the four horsemen of divorce, contempt, criticism, defensiveness, and stonewalling. Early on in our marriage, as a leftover from my previous relationship, I sometimes yelled and was unfair during disagreements. Looking back on my childhood, I didn't have a ton of modeling on different ways to express myself, and when sad, frustrated, or angry.
It took time and therapy to first feel my feelings. I had to learn how to understand my body's warning signals. Chris is an engineer, and as of now, I make more money than him. After the experience with my ex-husband, what does it matter? You're going to be a doctor anyway. I felt uneasy about whether Chris was attracted to me or my earning potential. When working long hours, I would say you'd be better off with somebody with a better schedule. You shouldn't be with me. Look at how much time you have to spend on your own.
Finally, one day he said, you have to stop saying that. I want to be with you. And if you keep saying that, it will end us. Looking back, I was scared of getting hurt. My insecurities manifested as attempts to test him with these phrases. The comments I made to him were an attempt at self-sabotage. I wasn't sure I was worthy of being with Chris, so I was throwing emotional flames at the relationship Thankfully, he set down this boundary that helped our relationship. I want to keep talking about money because it is an essential topic for women professionals.
When we were first married, I kept my checking account and Chris couldn't access that account. My paychecks went into the account and I deposited money into a joint account for joint expenses. Over the years, this has morphed and we have much more intertwined finances. I appreciate Chris's patience that even once married, I needed the space to keep my autonomy, including financially.
Sponsor Message: Heart of Medicine Retreat 4:06
While this may not be true for all relationships, having a lot of overlap in our personalities and interests helps Chris and me tremendously. We're both intense people, voracious readers, fast-paced and enjoy challenges. We also have similar aesthetic taste, which makes tailoring our home and making big purchases more straightforward. Anyone who looks at my husband will think he's a man's man. He's tall, strong, and athletic. He's also comfortable in his masculinity and doesn't shy away from what has been typically considered women's work in our society.
He cooks, bakes, and loves decorating our house for various holidays. His podcasts and reading lists includes books on women's experiences, strengthening our bond and his capacity to understand my experience as a woman in
Love, Compatibility, and Marriage Reflections 4:54
medicine in our society. Hey friends, Andrea here. There are moments in a doctor's life that mark you forever, and for me, they often involve travel. It's where I connect with awe and wonder that help me see my life and my career differently. The Heart of Medicine in Uluru, Australia, July 29-31, 2026, is a retreat that is an immersive, soul-level experience at one of the world's most sacred landscapes. It's a space to breathe again, to reconnect with your purpose, to hear your own voice without the noise of the busy clinical environments we all work in.
We'll gather a small group of clinicians for thought-provoking sessions, storytelling, cultural learning, and genuine rest. Spots are very limited. If your heart has been asking for something more, this is your invitation. Learn more and register at coachingfordoctors.net.au or you can email me at andrea at andreaaustinmd.com. Another lesson I learned is that you can love someone and not like them. I loved my first husband. I loved a few other men and realized that love alone is not enough. I like Chris.
He's fun to hang out with. I love talking to him on the phone. He's my favorite trip companion. Life is better with him. I've been out of the dating game a long time. My only advice is that if you're hustling for love, you better hustle out of that relationship. Chris and I never played games. It was never the will he or won't he call me, text me back dynamic. Thinking back to when that happened in other relationships made my stomach turn. I always felt like we were on equal footing and that I wasn't waiting to be picked or selected, but a mutual understanding that we both liked and respected each other and later loved each other.
A common phrase in our culture is marriage takes work. Chris and I sheepishly smile at each other when someone utters these words. We're going on 11 years. Now it's longer. We're actually going on 13 years married, 15 years together, and there's never been a day that's felt like work. I appreciate that some marriages require more work than others, but the work shouldn't involve you contorting to be another version of yourself. We can all grow. but make sure that the growth is along your heartline, your true essence.
A few reflection questions. Reflect. Sometimes boundaries get crossed or not even established in a relationship. Are there some boundaries you need to renegotiate? Reimagine. Consider new possibilities for greater connection. How would your life look if you improved your current relationship or created new connections?
Reflection Questions and Closing Remarks 7:38
Respond. Choose an action to strengthen the quality or quantity of connections. It might be communicating a new boundary, having a tough conversation, or protecting more time to nurture and grow your connections. So with that, this is a very short episode that I just wanted to pop in and say happy Galentine's Day, happy Valentine's Day. Go do something that shows that you love yourself and I can't wait to see you back. Keep following your heartline. Thank you for listening to Heartline, Changemaking, and Healthcare.
If this episode sparked something for you, I'd love for you to share it with a friend or colleague who's walking their own changemaker path. If you're interested in coaching, consulting, or speaking engagements, you can find me at andreaaustinmd.com or connect with me on LinkedIn and Instagram. I work with individuals and organizations who are ready to build meaningful, sustainable change without losing themselves in the process. The views expressed on this podcast are my own and do not reflect those of any organization I work for or with.
This podcast is for education and entertainment purposes only and is not intended as professional advice, including but not limited to medical or psychological guidance. Until next time, keep following your heartline.
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