Thursday, April 30, 2009
Thankful Thursday
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
On Call...
Speaking of babies Drew is now in his third week of his pediatrics rotation. His first three weeks are outpatient, and his next three weeks will be inpatient. This week he is actually on nursery, which personally I do not understand why its considered "outpatient" because the new babies are technically in the hospital?
I don't know about the rest of the country but it has been very rainy this week in central Illinois. We had rain all day Monday and Tuesday, which with the change in barometric pressure tends to cause women to go into labor. So the Drew has gotten to see lots of babies this week since the nursery has been filled!
This rain is another reason we think my friend may go into labor because although the rain subsided today it is forecasted for Thursday and Friday... So we'll be sleeping with our phone in our room tonight just in case we get paged...
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Wonderful weekend

Below is a photo of my wonderful parents, my goofball of a sister and her husband.
Sunday morning my parents made breakfast for my sister, her husband, Drew and I. We also spent the morning playing with Gaston. As you will notice he has a new haircut and looks quite different, but he is still ridiculously cute! The picture below truly captures just what a happy baby he is!
Here he is playing in the bathroom sink.

He is very much in the imitating stage. He shakes his head (no) and pretends to sneeze or blow his nose into kleenex when he sees anyone else do it. Oh the joy a child brings!
A change will do you good...
And 11 inches shorter....
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Here I am that night (we went out to dinner with Drew's family for his Birthday)
I'm still not sure if I like it, but I remind myself its only hair, it will grow back, and most importantly, it is for a good cause.
Friday, April 24, 2009
Thankful Thursday/Friday
I thought last week was going to be crazy busy, but I was so efficient at work that it wasn't too bad, unfortunately this week is the one that has been crazy busy but ....
- I am thankful that I am busy with happy/joyful things (Drew's birthday and preparations for another baby shower next week!)
- I was also busy baking like a mad woman this week but I am thankful that I have a large kitchen to do so (at least for an apartment);
- Also since I have to bake several hundred cookies for next weekends baby shower I am also thankful for a wonderful Mom who is always willing to help;
- I am thankful that the sun is shining when my alarm goes off in the morning and it's still out when I get home from work;
- I am thankful for tulips and all beautiful spring flowers;
- And although we have to travel, travel, the next three weekends, I am thankful that I have a wonderful husband that drives most of the time;
- And although some of our clients at work drive me crazy, I am also thankful that they keep my job entertaining.
Sorry I have been MIA things really have been (good) crazy!
Monday, April 20, 2009
Baseball season
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Neuroradiology Clerkship
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Thankful Thursday
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Fruit pizza
Refrigerated sugar cookie dough (16 oz)
8 oz cream cheese
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
Fruit of your choice
Pat dough into a 12 to 14 inch pizza pan.* Bake at 350 until golden brown. Cool completely. Beat softened cream cheese, sugar and vanilla until smooth and creamy. Spread on cooled cookie dough. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours. Top with fruit of choice such as strawberries, pineapple, kiwi, blueberries, mandarin oranges, etc.
Monday, April 13, 2009
Unexpected visitor
Sunday, April 12, 2009
Happy Easter!
I hope all of you had a wonderful weekend (and Blessed Easter for those who celebrate). I have been MIA lately just trying to catch up with things around the apartment and actually spending some quality time with Drew. Unfortunately this week is crazy busy with deadlines, I have an appellate Reply brief due Tuesday, and on Friday I have a Motion to Compel, Motion to Dismiss, an Appeal to an administrative review board and then Monday is an brief/petition to the Illinois Supreme Court (plus a few other less significant correspondence due in between all these things). So while I have things to update on, I doubt I will get to it this week. But hopefully I will be "back" next week!
Friday, April 10, 2009
Holy Friday
It was now about the sixth hour, and darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour, for the sun stopped shining. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Jesus called out with a loud voice, "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit." When he had said this, he breathed his last. Luke 23:44-46
For he died so that we may have everlasting life.
Sunday, April 5, 2009
Eventful Weekend
Sunday Morning Ghostwriter
Enough about my love for mornings, on to recent happenings. Yesterday, I ran the Lincoln Memorial Half Marathon. Unlike last year, when I saved some energy at the start and finished strong, I started strong this year and was unexpectedly dragging at the end. I managed to keep my pace though and achieved my goal of an hour and 40 mins. I finished in 1:39, 89th out of 983 people. The results definitely made dragging myself through the last 2 miles worth it. I don't remember those hills at the end being so daunting last year.
Neuroradiology is the new business at school, for last week and this coming week. I love the anatomy, and it is really helping in that aspect. The course is helpful and interesting, but definitely falls into the category of "Reasons I am Destined to be a Surgeon." I am way to fidgety to sit in a room and look at scans all day. And while I say I am an introvert, I do miss the patient interaction as well, radiologists have very little of this. It is maybe the most rewarding aspect of medicine.
Now on to the most exciting part of the week: sports. It has been 2 LONG months since the Super Bowl. Nothing really happened, the anticipation for baseball season building with each passing week (who am I kidding, each passing day). Then sports fans were blessed with this weeks happenings. The Bears uncharacteristically traded for Jay Cutler. Jay Freaking Cutler. A real quarterback, unlike anything we have had for like 40 years. No more Cade McNown, Henry Burris, Moses Moreno, Jonathan Quinn, Craig Krenzel....I could do this for a while but will spare you. Now Jay Cutler has his critics, but I am excited about the Bears having a 6'3", 230lb, rocket-armed quarterback. A top ten quarterback makes your team a threat in every game. Period.
That trade was just a bonus for me, as my favorite time of year is upon us: Baseball Season. The Cubs open the season on Monday. Hope springs eternal. Every year produces the same excitement. For 6 months my mood will largely be based on the outcome of that day's game or the recent quality of play. My wonderful wife tolerates this extremely well while stepping in when necessary to remind me that it is only a game. And I agree with her for the most part, but those of you who take fandom to a sometimes unhealthy level like myself know that is not quite true. I rise and fall with the team and can only hope that they reciprocate my feelings. I realize how ridiculous that sounds to some of you but I can't help it. Maybe someday they will return my feelings with the ultimate gift to the fans.
So anyway, that's what goes through my mind on a Sunday morning. Have a great week everyone.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
Thankful Thursday
As for the husband, tonight he is thankful for two things (don't tell but he was dancing in the living room). He is thankful that 1)the Bears now have a quarterback and that 2)the Cubs start next week. Oh, the little things that bring him joy!
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Loan Repayment (during residency)
Okay I think I may, (and I emphasize may) have figured it out... This has seriously been so frustrating. I know I posted before that I you could forbear your loans for the entirety of residency but since then I have heard a number of conflicting things. On various boards (namely iMSN) they keep talking about this new 15% rule. Various MS4s (fourth year medical students) who have been through their loan exit interviews have been saying that there is no more deferment/forbearance and that it has been replaced by this new 15% rule. Well after a few weeks of various inquiries and searches I have found this article.
To my now limited understanding the government has eliminated economic hardship forbearance. The economic hardship forbearance was nice because all residents qualified due to their modest incomes and it allowed residents to make NO payments their first three years of residency; also during this time interest did not acquire (or if it did I think the government paid it). After these three years of economic hardship forbearance were up residents could simply defer their payments if they wished and interest would continue to acquire on their loans.
Now this new plan does not allow residents to forbear at all and they can either defer and interest acquires (which I guess can be dangerous because interest continues to acquire and can capitalize and whatnot) or enter repayment. (This is the part where the information is even more sketchy are less reliable)
So if you ask me these new plan stinks! Consider that a $200,000 loan debt is quite normal for the average medical student. A 10-year repayment plan at the 6.8% interest rate amounts to.....
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$2,300 a month
The average residency salary is around $42,000 - this leaves a resident with approximately $500 a month to live.... (I'm not sure if you can put medical school loans on longer terms).... so obviously if a resident doesn't want to defer and have interest accrue and capitalize their only option (unless they have a sugar-daddy/momma or another massive source of income) is Income Based Repayment (IBR/the 15% rule). So this 15% rule looks pretty good... for a minute.... and if your not married to someone with student loan debts...
If your married (I was told that) your spouse has to sign onto this agreement and the problem can be that you are stuck paying 30% of your income (15% of both of your incomes towards each loan). While I am not sure if this is accurate - I was also told that an option to avoid this is to file separate taxes. (Which then causes you to lose out on several tax benefits - resulting in a different cost). But with the separate taxes then you would only each pay 15% of your own loans? I dunno this is all confusing stuff. While I would have no problem paying 15% of Drew's residency salary during his residency, I don't like the idea of having to pay 30% of both of our salaries, especially if we live in an expensive city. Based on my unscientific, uneducated, calculations, even if I was hypothetically making a meager $40,000 salary we could still be responsible for $2,000 a month payments ($80,000 * 15% then divided by 12 months). Then again I would hope the 15% rule is only based on take home pay, rather than before taxes salary.
Perhaps we can defer but still make optional payments? I just don't like the idea of having to pay a large payment every month. Good thing I have more than a year to figure (worry about) this thing out!
And since I was trying my hardest to find everything wrong with IBR I forgot to mention that the another advantage of it is that (again I think) that if your payments are still less than the rate that interest is acquiring then the government pays that interest. So I guess my final conclusion is that this IBR plan may not be a bad plan for single/unmarried residents but I think it could potentially be bad for married couples who both have student loans.
If you stayed with me this long - thanks for your patience... please leave comments or email me if you have more accurate information/corrections! Thanks!
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Busy weekend
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Why I love third year...
We were worried to start third year; we had heard it was going to be tough, long days, busy weekends and very little free time. I guess with all the worrying about how "terrible" it was going to be we weren't really prepared for Drew to enjoy it.
Once Drew got past the orientation part of his rotation he would come home each night so excited. He was different, it was like someone had relighted his fire and passion for medicine. Drew started with "longs" which are Internal Medicine (IM) and Surgery (and are called longs because they are 10 weeks, rather than the rest of the clerkships which are only six.) Typically the "longs" are considered the most intense and most demanding. And while they most certainly were, I still can say that Drew (and even I) have been so much happier than last year. Internal medicine usually started at six or seven and he was usually home by six or seven. He was gone Saturday mornings but most of his Sundays were protected (meaning he had the whole day off). Surgery was a little less consistent. Most days he started at five or so and was done by five-ish but there were the occasional days where he got out in the early afternoon or other days where he went till 8 or 9 at night. Weekends were the same is internal medicine. While this seems miserable keep in mind that Drew's "shorts" psychiatry and Oby-gyn thus far have been shorter days and offered him most weekends off.
Although the schedule of IM and surgery seems intense, it was really quite bearable. I kept myself busy by visiting friends some weekends and we made every Sunday our day, all day, even if it meant laying down on the couch all day. I have also learned to love even simply times like when I lay in his lap while he studies. While I have gotten a little off-course (thanks for staying with me here) the point of my post, is that I have found third year to be the most rewarding. There have been so many days where Drew has come home so excited, and although exhausted he couldn't wait to tell me what he got to see, hear, or do that day. For us it was like all that time that he had spent with his nose buried in a book had finally paid off. He has finally gotten to see so many of the things he had only before read about. He is actually working with real patients, with real problems. It made the idea of becoming a doctor a little more real.
My favorite of course was surgery because each night I could watch his eyes light up with such awe and enthusiasm as he spoke about his day. It didn't matter what he spoke about, it wasn't what he said, it was just so wonderful as a spouse to see the one I love find his passion. It was the acknowledgement and satisfaction that all his hard work (studying and self-discipline) had paid off. I think it also provided a huge amount of joy and relief for him to not only know that medicine really was his calling, but also to know what your calling is.
And while finding the right specialty can be stressful for some, when they do find it, there is just a huge sense of relief and contentment. So if your spouse struggles to find something they like my advice is to try and calm their fears and encourage them to just learn from what (rotation/clerkship) they are in, even it means learning that they never want to do it ever again!
So while third year takes some accommodation and adaptation, it is a very exciting time - especially as a significant other getting to watch your spouse transform from a student to a future doctor.
Thankful Thursdays
- My health and the health of my family and friends;
- Spring and the promise that summer is soon to follow;
- Babies in all their innocence, joy and unconditional love (if you look to my prayer requests - down and to the right- you will see that there are quite a few either newly arrived or on their way);
- Having finally adjusted to daylight savings time and therefore being able to appreciate the extra hours of sunlight at the end of the day;
- The fact that my wonderful husband made dinner almost every night this week (so that I could get things done and workout);
- Learning yoga and all of its wonderful benefits; and
- As always, my husband, my family, my friends, my job, my faith and the ability to pay our bills!
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
*Paging the Ob's Wife*
An Ob's wife who will remain nameless posted a comment on my blog and then deleted it - so my guess is that you wish to be anonymous so I'm not using your name in this post - I tried to contact you but your profile doesn't have an email and your blog doesn't allow for comments.