• I was surprised when people started calling me Mom when I was pregnant.
• I quickly began to hate it.
• It was all part of my identity crisis while transitioning to motherhood.

During pregnancy, people started referring to me as Mom. While some other pregnant women seemed to find this cute or sweet, I didn't. In fact, as my daughter (and my belly) grew larger and it was more and more obvious that I was pregnant, so did my annoyance with being called Mom or Mommy. It felt like the person I was, who had a name and a life separate from the life growing inside her, was starting to disappear.

The first place I was called Mom was at my prenatal appointments

It probably all started in the doctor's office. One of the (many) little failures of the prenatal and postpartum care period for me was being referred to as Mom at my birth center. It was not endearing to me — it felt lazy.

I wanted them to look at my chart and call me by my first name. It seemed like just another thing about the experience that was centered on the baby rather than the person who was growing the baby. I wanted to feel like they were looking at me as an individual, not just another of the hundreds of moms who visited their office every month.

My daughter is now 6, and I still dislike being called Mom, Mommy, or Mama in place of my name by other adults. This is especially true in medical settings, like my daughter's pediatrician's office; it feels like they're not taking my concerns seriously. It also feels infantilizing, distancing, and dismissive.

Motherhood caused an identity crisis

After my daughter was born, I was suddenly no longer a writer, a reader, a wife, a chocolate lover, an anglophile, a person who pooped in private. I was a mom, and my responsibility was to care for the well-being of my daughter. It felt like everything else just fell by the wayside. I felt like my identity as a person — a dynamic, well-rounded person — had been snatched away from me. And being called Mom instead of my name by people who weren't my actual child just seemed to reinforce that.

I am sure that being a stay-at-home mom also contributed to this feeling of no longer having a purpose beyond new parenthood, though I know working parents also experience this.

When my daughter was around 18 months old, I spent a weekend away from her for the first time. I spent much of the train ride to my destination feeling guilty for leaving her. I wondered: Will she be confused? Will she think I've abandoned her? I felt unspoken judgment from others when they asked me who was watching my daughter while I was away. Like I didn't deserve time to myself or to explore my own interests apart from her.

I've rediscovered my identity since my daughter was a baby

The only person I love to hear call me Mom is my daughter. In fact, now that she's 6, I miss her calling me Mama like when she was a baby. It's just another reminder that my daughter is growing up.

Since those earlier days of motherhood, I've been able to rediscover who I am apart from my daughter, and being called Mom doesn't irk me the way it used to. The older my daughter gets, the more time I've been able to spend doing the things I love: writing, traveling, reading, crafting. And I've been able to share them with her as well.

• The latest "White Lotus" season was filmed at the Four Seasons Resort Koh Samui in Thailand.
• Previous seasons filmed at Four Seasons resorts in Hawaii and Italy led to increased interest.
• Thailand expects a 20% rise in visitors due to the show's influence, the Four Seasons said.

Fictional guests have officially checked in to the "The White Lotus" hotel for the third season of the hit TV series. As the backdrop for vacationers this season, a Four Seasons resort in Thailand is already getting a boost in interest from IRL tourists.

"The White Lotus," an HBO TV show that follows a cast of characters on lavish vacations, was filmed at the Four Season Resort Koh Samui this time round. The resort, on a Thai island, told Business Insider that it's already seeing a jump in interest since the first episode aired on February 16. Its second episode aired in the US on February 23.

A spokesperson for Four Seasons Koh Samui said the hotel is experiencing a surge "in terms of availability checks, searches, and bookings." It's the third time "The White Lotus" has been filmed at a Four Seasons; production previously took place at locations in Hawaii and Italy for the first and second seasons, respectively. Searches for hotels and flights to Sicily from the US increased by over 50% while season two was airing, according to travel booking site Hopper.

The show also filmed at the Anantara Mai Khao Villas hotel in Phuket, a separate Thai island, for some scenes. Representatives for Anantara and HBO didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from BI.

"There is also increased interest in Thailand itself as a travel destination, and the Director of Thailand's Tourism Authority has said they expect about 20% rise in tourism as a result of the show," the Four Seasons Koh Samui spokesperson said. They didn't specify over which time period.

The season 3 premiere attracted 4.6 million total viewers in the US between Sunday and Monday, up 90% from the season 2 premiere, HBO said. IMDb included "White Lotus" in its top 10 most-anticipated TV shows set to return in 2025.

In 2021, Cascade Investment, the investment firm for billionaire Bill Gates, bought a controlling stake in the resort chain. He purchased it from Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal's Kingdom Holding and paid $2.2 billion in cash. Anantara is owned by Minor Hotels, founded by American businessman William Heinecke.

Four Seasons Maui at Wailea in Hawaii — where season one was shot — told BI that it knows the "White Lotus effect" well. A spokesperson said it experienced a 425% increase in website visits and a 386% increase in availability checks year over year when the show first aired in 2021.

Four years later, it says guests are still asking about the fictional "Pineapple Suite," a redecorated version of the real Lokelani Presidential Suite, which costs $29,000 a night. Starting March 14, the resort said it will offer a "White Lotus" experience to guests for a limited time, offering them cocktails inspired by the series and more.

Three nights in May in a serenity pool villa will cost about $1,363 a night on average for a one-bedroom villa at the Koh Samui resort, according to its website. A four-bedroom residence villa with a pool will run to about $7,866 per night. When BI previously searched its accommodation prices for a May 2024 stay last January, the rates were $1,281 and $7,746, respectively.

• Christian Lovell shares six signs your boss might want you to quit your job.
• Lovell, a career coach, highlights communication and workload changes as key indicators.
• In a tough job market, understanding these signs can help you prepare for career shifts.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Christian Lovell, a 31-year-old career coach from Los Angeles. It has been edited for length and clarity.

I'm the founder of Careers by Chris, a growing online community of job seekers, and a former career expert at Sofi. I help people figure out the next steps in their careers and how to land their next job.

On my Instagram, I share actionable, understandable, and easily digestible career growth tips that people may not have learned in school. I answer common questions like: How do I build an effective résumé? What's an applicant tracking system? How do I market myself for a role that I want?

In the current job market and economy, one question to consider is: How do I know if my boss wants me to quit? This job market is the toughest I've ever seen, and you must be prepared for anything.

Although just one sign alone might not be an indicator, here are six signs your boss might want you to quit and what to do next.

1. Your boss is communicating less

A lack of communication is one sign that your boss might be pushing you to quit. If they're decreasing your one-on-ones, making it hard to communicate with them, or if you're unable to get the support you need, it could indicate that developing you as an employee is no longer a priority.

On their end, it wouldn't make sense to pour resources into further developing you if they don't plan to keep you around.

2. Your boss stops having discussions about your future at the company

Similarly, discussions about your future might stop if they don't see you having a future at the company. They might no longer say things during your performance reviews, like, "In three months or six months, this will be happening," or they may stop mentioning your promotion altogether.

If you say to your manager, "Hey, I want to talk about my next steps," and they're not open to having those conversations, that's a red flag.

This might mean they're making excuses or perpetually putting things off. They may feel guilty about letting you go, they might not yet have all the information themselves, or they might not be at liberty to talk about it.

3. Your boss is excluding you

Another sign your boss might be pushing you to quit is if they start excluding you from important meetings or other key forms of communication, such as emails, team meetings, or Slack channels.

If you've been part of a project update every month or week, and suddenly you're no longer included, that can be a sign. There could be many excuses for why you're being excluded from important projects or meetings, like "it was an oversight" or "we're changing how we're structuring this project."

It could also indicate that your work is being reassigned or that they're removing you from projects because they no longer see you as part of the company's future. Again, understanding these decisions in context is important. How often is this happening? How relevant are the projects you're excluded from to your core job duties?

4. Your boss is giving you busy work

If you realize you're not on any important projects and feel like you're doing busy work, that can also be an indicator.

This could look like being asked to do tasks below your normal job duties, like summarizing meeting notes, instead of the important projects you were once on.

5. Your boss is giving you too much work

You might also be given an unbearable amount of work. Your boss could set unrealistic expectations and then document them, saying, "I asked my employee to do X, Y, and Z, and they failed to do it. So now there is a reason to let them go," or you might say, "This is unbearable, and I need to quit."

I've seen this happen to a lot of people. Once it happens, I tell them they should be searching if they have inklings they're being pushed out of their job. Do not wait until you can't bear it, or they let you go.

When it comes to finding new work, you won't list your reason for leaving a job on a résumé, so your next company would not know if you quit or were fired, but there will be times when you have to explain your departure from the company, like in future interviews.

There are pros and cons to quitting or waiting to be let go, and the best choice will depend on where you are in your career.

6. Your boss placed you on a PIP

PIPs (performance improvement plans) do not 100% mean you'll be fired from your job, but they are a sign. PIPs are used to create a paper trail — and, in many cases, let the employee go.

If you're put on a PIP, you should make arrangements to find another job. PIPs can be a sign they're preparing to have a final conversation with you and let you go. PIPs are usually paired with micromanaging and unrealistic or unreasonable workloads.

Regardless of whether you're on a PIP, never fully remove yourself from the market. Keep your résumé updated and your network warm.

What to do next

Seeing one of these signs doesn't necessarily mean your boss wants to let you go. Instead of jumping to conclusions, ask yourself: Are there multiple signs? Could it just be your imposter syndrome? And most importantly, have things with your boss shifted from one extreme to the other?

If you do feel your boss wants you to quit, you should first have a conversation with them. Document your achievements, and if you feel your time at the company is ending one way or the other, start your job search.

• The outsize returns VCs depend on might be out of reach through healthcare M&A this year.
• VCs told BI they don't see much appetite for big deals among healthcare's historical mega-buyers.
• Healthcare startups looking to sell may have to settle for lower prices from their peers.

Healthcare startups are hoping for more M&A in the market this year after a three-year drought of company combinations. But most VCs aren't expecting to reap blockbuster returns through big healthcare deals anytime soon.

The industry's historical mega-buyers — from Big Tech and retail to health plans and private equity — don't seem to have much of an appetite for big digital health deals this year, according to nearly a dozen VCs and investment bankers Business Insider spoke to.

Big Tech companies like Amazon and retailers like Walgreens have already made multibillion-dollar buys in healthcare and, in some cases, been burned by their losses. Insurers like United Healthcare are facing mounting scrutiny, said these investors. While private equity seems increasingly interested in healthcare technologies, many of PE firms' recent big healthcare buys have been public companies, and often those already demonstrating stable revenue and profitability, rather than high-growth startups.

Many healthcare startups are looking to get bought or raising down rounds to extend their lifespans, sometimes offering discounts on their last-round valuations to make a deal happen, BI reported in November. Better-performing startups, especially later-stage players, may not want to sell as investors hope for a reopening in the IPO markets that could help them recoup their returns, VCs told BI.

On the bright side, those descending valuations offer plenty of opportunities for late-stage digital health startups flush with cash and looking to grow. Healthcare startups like Transcarent have already announced acquisitions this year, while others like Datavant have signaled they're ready for an M&A spree.

Still, the outsize returns VCs depend on might be out of reach through healthcare M&A for the time being.

"M&A can be a great outcome. It just feels like there's not a lot of buyers that can do the kinds of deals that we would hope for for that big outcome," said IVP partner Yuri Lee.

Tech and retail's healthcare struggles

2024 brought a reckoning for retail healthcare as a number of large companies looked to downsize, sell off, or shut down their healthcare bets.

Walmart shut down its entire Walmart Health division in April, including its 51 health centers and its virtual care services. Walgreens closed at least 160 of its VillageMD primary care clinics throughout the year; the pharmacy retailer said in an August securities filing that it was considering selling part or all of its controlling stake in VillageMD, which Walgreens paid more than $6 billion for.

CVS, which owns a number of healthcare businesses, including the insurer Aetna and the primary care clinic chain Oak Street Health, swapped out its CEOs in October after undergoing a strategic review, where the company reportedly considered splitting up its retail and insurance businesses as it faced rising costs from Medicare Advantage claims, according to Reuters. (For its part, CVS has forged on with its expansion of Oak Street Health, which it bought for $10.6 billion in 2023. The pharmacy business continued opening new clinics throughout the year as other retailers backed off their own in-person healthcare bets.)

A CVS Health spokesperson declined to comment for this story but said the company is "focused on executing on our integrated care strategy." Walmart declined to comment. Walgreens didn't respond to a request for comment.

Some of Big Tech's healthcare investments underwent their own struggles last year. While Amazon's pharmacy business is drawing more consumer interest, its primary care business One Medical, which Amazon said in 2022 it was acquiring for $3.9 billion, lost Google as a large enterprise client in 2024 and faced an ongoing wrongful death lawsuit. Amazon also scrapped its telehealth business, Amazon Care, in 2022.

Amazon declined to comment on its M&A strategy. A spokesperson said the company is committed to One Medical's continued growth and plans to expand next to New Jersey, Northeast Ohio, and Westchester County, New York. The spokesperson said One Medical has contracts with around 10,000 employers and growing.

Investors said that while players like Amazon may look around for smaller acquisitions to tack onto their existing offerings — especially those they can get at a discount — those buyers aren't likely to take another big swing anytime soon.

"I think it's fair to say that they've had a lot of large-scale failures in trying to buy nationally scaled assets that would impose consistency on the system. It just doesn't work like that," said Dan Mendelson, the CEO of JPMorgan's healthcare fund Morgan Health, of large tech and retail companies like Amazon. "As soon as you move to more of a national system, you lose the quality control and a lot of the economic viability."

Steadier buyers may snub startups

For the likely buyers among health insurance's top players, federal scrutiny and a public reckoning could hamper megadeals this year.

UnitedHealth Group's Optum spent more than $31 billion on acquisitions between 2022 and 2024. UnitedHealth is currently trying to close a $3.3 billion deal to acquire home-health company Amedisys. But the Department of Justice sued to block the merger in November, citing antitrust concerns.

Some other health plan mergers fell through last year, including early talks between Anthem and Cigna about a potential combination, per Bloomberg. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Louisiana also called off plans to sell itself to Elevance Health in February after facing regulatory pushback.

For health plans, the elephant in the room is the December murder of former UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, which ignited a public outcry over how health insurers pay for patient care, or, more accurately, how frequently they deny paying for it. PitchBook senior healthcare analyst Aaron DeGagne said insurers may seek to lay low for the next few months as criticism mounts — "A lot of things could be misinterpreted," he said.

Despite those headwinds, DeGagne noted that health plans are hoping to tap into recent advancements in healthcare AI technologies to make their prior authorization and claims processes more efficient. He said he thinks health plans will notch more startup partnerships this year, and likely make their own investments in the sector, before they turn to acquisitions.

UnitedHealth Group didn't respond to requests for comment for this story.

Private equity firms have remained active in healthcare and shelled out billions of dollars on a handful of deals last year, like R1 RCM's August take-private by two private equity firms for $8.9 billion, the second biggest US healthcare deal in 2024, according to PitchBook.

Private equity's healthcare interest could certainly continue through 2025, especially as firms hope for falling interest rates and less regulatory scrutiny under a new presidential administration.

However, private equity firms often require acquisitions to be profitable or nearly profitable. In VC, investors aren't exactly itching to sell off their late-stage profitable healthcare bets — since many of those could be candidates for IPOs once the public markets reopen, Mendelson said.

"It is definitely the case that private equity buyers are attractive to middle-market companies. But the larger companies have to be thinking about an IPO," he said.

Moreover, private equity's healthcare playbook has historically relied on buying up individual healthcare practices, like medspas or home health centers. Those models generally bring in slower but more reliable revenue streams rather than explosive growth potential. Healthtech, a VC favorite, wasn't significantly represented in the top megadeals last year — of the 25 biggest US healthcare and life sciences deals in 2024, R1 RCM was the only true healthtech deal, with most of the other deals being in healthcare services or biopharma, per PitchBook.

So while private equity could certainly look to buy more healthcare companies this year, they may not be the sexy deals VCs are looking for, said Krish Ramadurai, a partner at AIX Ventures.

"A lot of the boring services companies with great margins and great product market fit are prime takeouts right now. And if you have the AI angle, even better," he said.

M&A-hungry healthcare unicorns

This year, some of the most active buyers of venture-backed healthcare startups may just be other startups.

Several healthcare startups have signaled their intentions to look for M&A in 2024. Datavant CEO Kyle Armbrester told Business Insider in January that the $7 billion health data startup plans to make more acquisitions this year, a strategy that could help the company continue to grow its revenue ahead of a potential IPO. Other startups approaching public market debuts may use a similar playbook, like Hinge Health, which has been open about its plans to make more acquisitions for its physical therapy business.

Venture capital firms may also work to combine multiple companies within their portfolios to minimize their losses, as healthcare firm 7wireVentures did in selling mental health investment Caraway to its pediatric healthcare investment Summer Health. General Catalyst has taken the same approach for numerous healthcare deals over the years; most recently, its health software bet Commure acquired care navigation platform Memora Health in December.

In fact, a number of General Catalyst's portfolio companies look poised to make acquisitions this year. One of its investments, health benefits platform Transcarent, already made a big bet with its $621 million acquisition of healthcare navigator Accolade in January. Commure has taken an M&A-forward strategy to drive its growth, with seven acquisitions to date, including two in 2024. Care enablement startup Fabric has made four acquisitions since launching out stealth in early 2023, and CEO Aniq Rahman told Business Insider in September that the company was still looking for deals.

"A lot of the companies that are struggling to go raise capital right now, or some of these larger businesses that are reevaluating their position in the market, are creating opportunities for us as well," Rahman said. "Pretty much every week, there's inbound coming in from investors that are like, we have assets in our portfolio that may be accretive to what you're doing with Fabric."

All told, there may yet be options for digital health startups hoping to get acquired and for the investors desperate for returns, even if billion-dollar deals aren't on the table.

"Founders and investors are getting impatient over exit timelines, and they can only stay impatient for so long," Pitchbook's DeGagne said.

Three years into Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russia is making only small-scale advances on the battlefield but has the upper hand both militarily and diplomatically.

The big picture: Russia has superior manpower and firepower, particularly with U.S. military support in question. President Trump has further tightened the vise with his initial approach to peace talks.

• Trump ruled out NATO membership or a U.S.-led peacekeeping mission for Ukraine, falsely claimed Ukrainian "dictator" Volodymyr Zelensky started the war, and excluded Ukraine from a first round of peace talks with the Russians.
• Trump has claimed Russia's Vladimir Putin could take "the whole country" on the battlefield if he wished — though Putin only managed to take around 1% of Ukraine's territory in 2024.
• The battle lines haven't shifted all that much since 2022 despite heavy casualties on both sides, with Russia occupying around one-fifth of the country altogether.

How control of Ukrainian territory has shifted

Flashback: Russia began a three-front lightening offensive on Feb. 24, 2022 but failed in its primary objective of taking Kyiv and was also rebuffed in the south and east (see second map).

• Zelensky became an international icon by remaining in Kyiv and rallying the nation. As Russian forces pulled back, horrific war crimes were uncovered in places like Bucha.
• Ukraine liberated vast swathes of the Kharkiv, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions in a fall, 2022 counteroffensive (third map).

Turning point: Ukraine's much-heralded 2023 counteroffensive failed. A war of attrition set in, with both sides taking heavy losses and Russia making small-scale advances.

• While it has primarily been Russia on the offensive since then, Ukraine launched a cross-border incursion last August and occupied parts of the Kursk and Belgorod regions.
• Russia has reclaimed much of that territory and is making slow advances in multiple zones of eastern Ukraine (fourth map).

Driving the news: Russia is also continuing its attacks on civilian infrastructure, and launched its largest drone attack of the war on Saturday.

By the numbers: Troop and civilian casualties

Ukrainian troop casualties: Zelensky said recently that more than 46,000 Ukrainian soldiers had been killed and over 390,000 wounded. Other estimates are considerably higher.

Russian troop casualties: Russia has not released casualty numbers for its troops since 2022. Estimates vary widely, but most put Russia's losses somewhat higher than Ukraine's.

• A Mediazona-BBC News project to track Russian troop fatalities has recorded 93,641 deaths.
• The Ukrainian military claimed on Thursday that Russia had suffered more than 800,000 "battlefield losses," presumably including those captured or severely wounded.
• Kyiv also claims around 3,000 North Korean troops fighting in Ukraine have been killed.

Civilian casualties: The UN reported over 12,340 civilian deaths in Ukraine as of late 2024, and noted the true total was likely "much, much higher."

• Tens of thousands of civilians likely died in the 2022 siege of Mariupol alone, AFP notes.
• Around 63,000 Ukrainians have been reported missing, according to a government database.

The scale of destruction in Ukraine

The Kyiv School of Economics puts the destruction Russia has inflicted on Ukraine at $155 billion, by replacement cost.

• The majority of those losses are to housing and infrastructure. Russia has targeted Ukraine's energy infrastructure in particular, causing rolling blackouts in Kyiv and other cities around the country.
• An NYT analysis last year found 210,000 buildings leveled across Ukraine. That includes hundreds of schools, hospitals and government buildings.
• Some towns in eastern Ukraine have been entirely destroyed and emptied of civilians. Conditions for the civilians remaining in areas occupied by Russia are often dreadful.

What to watch: Prospects for peace

For a peace deal to be possible, Putin and Zelensky would both have to soften their irreconcilable positions.

Putin claimed four Ukrainian regions as part of Russia in 2022, despite the fact that significant portions of those areas remain in Ukrainian hands. He has said they must remain part of Russia.

• He has also demanded that Ukraine "demilitarize" and abandon its goal of NATO membership.

Zelensky continues to lobby for admission to NATO, despite Trump's position that it's "impractical."

• He had long insisted Ukraine's full territorial integrity must be restored, but has more recently acknowledged that's unlikely in the near term.
• He is unwilling to countenance "demilitarization" and insists on robust security guarantees for Ukraine as part of any deal, to prevent Russia from resuming its invasion when the time is ripe.

While the Trump administration has said U.S. troops will not take part, Trump told Zelensky a European peacekeeping force could make sense, Axios' Barak Ravid reports.

• Zelensky also told Trump that Putin is only pretending to want peace.