It is another beautiful, peaceful morning. Dean is still asleep as I sit here on the couch with my computer, with the morning sun brightening the room and a view overlooking the city:
The view from where I’m sitting. The tall building in the background is the Sears Tower. I refuse to call it by it’s new name (Willis Tower).
The only sound right now is the hum of the refrigerator. I love the “sound” of silence…it is during these times that I can process my thoughts, hear my voice, hear God’s voice…..
Yesterday, after my lazy morning, we drove out to the suburbs to meet Dean’s sister Emily for a sushi-filled lunch. We just love this one sushi restaurant near where she lives that has an all-you-can-eat sushi deal. Unlimited sushi = dangerously good, and we went out to town ordering godzilla rolls, spider rolls, nigiri, soup, and much more.
Their Godzilla Roll was ginormous, and Emily challenged Dean and I to eat the end pieces in one mouthful:
We make a classy couple.
Mission accomplished!
Afterwards, we met up with Dean’s other sister, Katie and hung out with her and her two nephews. Dean and Donovan spent the afternoon hard at work building a Leggo police car:
Isn’t Donovan’s plaid shirt just adorable?
My favorite moment up there while those two were working on the Leggos was when Donovan looked at Dean’s hair and said, “Your hair is sticking up too much. You need a haircut.” Haha. It was especially funny hearing a four year old tell this to Dean knowing how much pride Dean takes in his hair : )
Yesterday one of my friends got engaged, and not long ago another good friend of mine from college got engaged! I’m at that age now (late 20s-early 30s) where EVERYONE seems to be either getting engaged or popping out babies. I seriously need to start a savings account not for my wedding, but for everyone else’s weddings! Haha, but seriously, it makes me so happy to see the friends I love meet that special person and be so happy together. It’s an exciting time.
And the babies….holy babies! I feel like half of my facebook feed are pictures of my friends’ babies! You would think I would get annoyed by it, but I actually love it. The only thing I’m not crazy about is when people post pictures of their ultrasound….I’m quite fine NOT seeing a picture of your uterus, thank you : )
Of course, seeing all my friends starting families makes me excited about having a family one day, and naturally, since I’m getting married soon, I’ve thought about it myself.
For better or worse, there are few things in my life I don’t plan for. Naturally, if God has another plan for you, you roll with it and change “your” plans, but I don’t like leaving things to chance. I’m not at a point in my life/career where I can just “get pregnant when it happens.” Like, delivering a baby right before my boards (as I know one person who did) would not be ideal. Nor would having morning sickness during the full day board exam.
Having children during residency is challenging. People do it. They make it work, but I don’t know if I’d be able to. I remember my intern year showing up at the hospital at 5:15 in the morning to get ready for surgical rounds. My colleague, who was just starting her 24-30 hour call at that time, was already there and had already been up since 3:00 am breast feeding and taking care of her young baby she had delivered not that long ago. Again, this was before a 24-30 hour call. I never once heard her complain and she did just fine, but boy, it is not easy.
Of course, this brings up the question, is there ever a good time?? If you’re in residency, it’s hard, because you’re working less than ideal hours and trying to learn all you can. These are your crucial years to become as well trained in your chosen field as possible. The same thing applies to fellowship. And then as an attending, you don’t want to join a new practice and then be like, “see ya! I’m on maternity leave. Be back in 6 weeks.” Of course if you wait until you’re a few years into your practice, well then your internal clock is ticking, because by then you’re in your mid to late 30s, and if you want multiple kids….
So there really is NO ideal time. Personally, had I been married when I was younger, I don’t think I’d be able to have a kid during residency. I think I would have been a less than ideal resident and a less than ideal mother. I would have been stretched too thin, too stressed, and too tired to do either “job” well. I’m NOT saying it’s NOT good to have a kid during residency, and I am NOT saying that if you do have a kid during residency you won’t be as good of a resident or Mom, I’m just saying that I don’t think I would be. Everyone is different. For those who do make it happen, I greatly admire you–and I don’t say that sarcastically. I am serious, I don’t know how you do it!!
QUESTIONS:
Favorite sushi roll?
This is a touchy subject, but for my friends/readers pursuing busy careers, did you put a lot of thought into the timing of starting a family? If you’re a physician, did you or could you handle having a kid during residency?
Only a radiology resident would look at the uterus on an ultrasound.
haha, but seriously, they all look the same when they’re curled up in the womb.
They say if you wait for a good time to have kids or retire you will never do both. I’m with you though, that all my friends are getting engaged and having babies.
So true…and really the whole “waiting until the perfect circumstances” can apply to so many things in life…if you wait for the “perfect” time, it will never come!
Favorite roll is a Rainbow Roll. Godzilla Roll sounds awesome. Nice skyline pic.
Yummmm, rainbow is delicious, too. I don’t think there’s a roll I don’t like!
I’ve thought a lot about kids, and my husband and I have talked about it a lot … lots of if/when/how/how many. We’re 30/32, we’ve been married 5 years, have nieces and nephews (on both sides) so of course we get a lot of questions/comments about when we’ll have kids. We both work full-time, and I don’t think either of us want to be a stay at home parent right now, and currently we live with my parents for financial reasons, so we can’t exactly afford to start a family. If it happened unexpectedly, we’d just roll with it, but lately we’ve been talking a lot about adoption. Not because we’ve had trouble conceiving (we’ve never intentionally tried to do so), but because that feels like the “best” way for us to have a family. Which also removes any kind of timeline before I reach “scary” pregnancy age. But who knows. I know adoption is a long, expensive, frustrating process, so maybe we’ll give up and decide the “old fashioned way” is easier. Or maybe we’ll just decide we can live a happy, fulfilling life just the two of us. Needless to say, we definitely don’t have it figured out in the least.