Listening to the radio while I drove recently, I caught a comedian ranting about being told he was overweight by a doctor with the same predicament, and how the two sort of bonded and quickly dropped the subject after that.

Meanwhile, I still remember a diabetes expert from years ago who couldn’t button his lab coat!

Like it or not, we doctors are under a certain amount of scrutiny. People check out our grocery carts, our cars, lawns, clothes and body sizes (mostly organic, 2010 German SUV with 412,000km, coastal scrappy and professionally maintained lush but with dandelions up north, always a tie, 75kg).

A certain amount of self-disclosure and deprecation can be a good thing, but too much can get in the way of a therapeutic relationship.