This Is Going to Hurt – Season 1 Episode 2 Recap & Review

Under Pressure

Episode 2 of This is Going to Hurt begins with Adam still reeling from his big mistake. Unfortunately, the gang have lost a swab during another cesarean and they need to search inside the patient. Thankfully Adam is saved at the last second by Tracy showing back up with the baby, who happens to have the swabs there. Phew.

Despite making it back to his apartment, Adam is wired and struggles to sleep. He stays up through the night, even knitting at one point. When Harry shows up in the morning, Adam promises that he’ll be back soon but at work, he’s overly cautious on every single patient.

Despite wanting to CT a patient he believes has severe abdominal pain, Lockhart and his assistant Julian want to send her home. So Adam decides to let her stay the night as a sort of middle ground compromise.

Mrs Winnicka is a regular patient on the ward and there’s some pretty funny banter between her and Adam when he heads in to see her. While this is going on, Shruti comes under fire from the other nurses who question what she’s doing. She covers for Adam but it’s clear she’s under a lot of stress too.

That night, Adam ends up going for dinner with Greg and his partner. Despite them not wanting to find out the sex of their baby, Adam slips up and reveals that “she’s beautiful”. Oof.

It turns out this was intentional, as Adam admits later on to Harry that he’s jealous of them and intentionally ruined their night. He also refuses to talk to Harry about how he feels and what’s going on too, causing a rift between them.

The next day, Adam is berated by Lockhart’s crony, Julian, for keeping the patient with abdominal pain on the ward. He’s sent her home and stresses the importance of following directions.

Adam is stressed and eventually heads outside the hospital for some air… and a cigarette. Whilst there, Adam manages to spot a patient in a lot of discomfort and makes the right call bringing her into the theatre. Does it make up for a whole bunch of incidents and bad calls all day? Well, that’s for Mr Lockhart to decide.

Adam is brought into Lockhart’s office after all this, where he has a massive wall full of baby pictures behind him. Unfortunately, Lockhart has bad news. Erika – the patient with the 25 week C-section – has decided to lodge a complaint.

At home, Harry tries to encourage Adam to open up and tell him what’s going on …but instead he asks Harry to marry him. “No?” He replies in confusion.

The Episode Review

With Adam haunted by what’s happened in the previous episode, there’s a really nice ebb and flow to this show that balances out how hard and stressful doing this job is with some genuinely well worked laughs.

The personal and professional life balance (or lack thereof) for those who work on the ward is really nicely showcased and there’s a definite appreciation for how hard our nurses and doctors actually work. In that respect, this chapter is far more serious than the opener.

However, it also helps to show just how crucial a support system actually is in this line off work. With Adam still struggling to open up and his job becoming ever-more stressful, it’ll be interesting to see where the tipping point is for Adam and what helps him to open up.

Seeing more of Shruti and how stressed she is, especially with balancing her hands-on experience with studying for her exams, is a nice way to level out the central focus on Adam across to other characters and show they too are suffering.

Either way though, everything here is balanced nicely on a knife-edge for the episodes ahead.