On Working Ourselves Out of a Job

**Tiny was disappointed when after loading up the car to go in the morning, we learned we'd have to wait until the evening to attend a pirate adventure program at the beach. But she worked it out, and was super excited when the time actually came to go get all 'pirated' up.**

During my Junior year of college, I spent a lot of time preparing to take the MCAT (the dreaded medical school admissions test). It felt like torture to finish my regular coursework, then spend my free time attending review courses. Every Saturday was spent taking 8 hour practice tests. Every evening was filled with practice questions. So when I finished the test in the spring, I don't think I'd ever been quite so glad to see something come to an end. I had nightmares about it for months afterward.


**Learning pirate language and hearing about new pirate threats to have nightmares about.**

And then 4 weeks after the exam, I got my score. It was a good score. It would've probably gotten me into the same medical schools I ended up getting into. But you know what? It didn't match my high expectations for myself, and I was devastated. Devastated. It felt like all my work had been in vain, because surely if I didn't get the score I had hoped for, nothing was going to work out after all.


**Pinky promising to keep the pirate code.**

I called my mother, sobbing in the 'my world has just come to a screeching halt' sort of way. I'd been supposed to stay up at school for the summer, but I remember sobbing over and over, "I just want to come home. I want to come home!" I couldn't face it--the possibility of retaking this exam. I just wanted sit with my mom on our couch in CA and have her tell me it was going to be fine, and that she'd take care of me while I got through this rough patch. But you know what? That's not what she did.


**I'd have liked a water cannon at the time to take my frustration out on the world.**

"You can't come home, sweetie. Do you think you need to retake the test?"

"Probably. But Mom, I just can't do it. I want to come home!" More tears.

"Well, you can't come home. You need to stay up there and figure out how to deal with the next step in this situation."


**Not that we don't ever need a helping hand. Uncle B lends Tiny his cannon expertise.**

My mom is totally loving, but she does not coddle. It's not like I'd actually expected her to let me come home. She'd always expected me to push forward and come up with solutions. She knew I was capable. So you know what I did? I dried my tears, picked myself up, and registered for the exam again. I stayed up at school and I studied. Luckily, one of my brilliant best friends was going through the exact same thing, and had also decided to retake it. So, we studied together. And I learned more about persisting in things that are uncomfortable, but are necessary.


**Pirate Pete got a little taste of uncomfortable when the water cannons knocked him off his raft and into the ocean.**

At the end of those two months, when I'd persevered in doing something that felt akin to torture, I flew home to Cali to take the actual exam. Again.

The relief I felt when my dad picked me up from UC Berkeley at the end of that day was immense.


**Her smile gives it away: it was worth the wait.**

And what's more: The joy I felt when I got my rockin' second score in the mail? Now that's a feeling that can only be earned through blood, sweat and tears.


**Like finding the treasure at the end of a pirate adventure.**

My mom used to say that she knew her role as a mother was to 'work herself out of a job'. Meaning, if she was doing things right, she was preparing us to be able to live life without her. I take care of a lot of parent/kid duos in my practice, and I see less and less of this. I see parents as involved in managing their 20-something year old's life as they probably were when the kid was 14.

Something is wrong with this, and this article I saw on CJane helped me to understand what.

"How to Land Your Kid in Therapy."

My parents let me experience disappointment, helped me discover my own problem solving skills, and encouraged me to keep at something even when it was hard. Reading this article made me so grateful for that all over again. And made me hope that I can accomplish that with my kiddos.

It will be tempting to want to rescue our kids when they run up against the disappointments and unpleasantries of life, and come to us sobbing. But I hope I can be strong and rescue them the way my mom did: by letting them rescue themselves.

This and That

*This morning was gray and rainy. Tiny woke up and crawled into bed just a few minutes before my alarm went off. And since there would be nothing better than letting her snuggle between us for an extra half an hour of sleep on a rainy morning, I was more disappointed than usual when my phone went off moments later. Especially since I was supposed to be in half an hour earlier than normal to staff the walk-in clinic.

I Eeyeor'ed my way through my get-ready routine, and kissed the family goodbye. I tried to keep my pack mule self (laptop bag, lunch bag, Medela pump bag, gift bag) dry as I darted through the raindrops to my car.

When I walked in to my office, I was surprised to see that no one waiting to be seen. I guess the rain, or rather the dramatic forecasts for the rain, had kept them all home for an extra hour or two. So, my nurse and I put our feet up and talked about life, her upcoming move, and the office happenings.

I'd rather have snuggled my littles, but a slow start and a nice conversation with my nurse, were good consolation prizes on this cozy day.

*That photo shoot with my talented friend, Tab, was a lot of fun. As a mom, I feel like I rarely end up in the shot with my kids, so I'm so happy to have some of me with them.




*This week a lot of patients have been asking me what I think of the Atkins diet. Seeing as I don't think much of it, I should direct them to this article. The Mediterranean diet has much to recommend it--including good science!

*That Lil' Drummer is a sweet natured little guy. He is particularly sweet natured when you don't try to prevent him from the following types of activities:




*This weekend, Rockstar and I have two dates planned, and I'm pretty happy about it. I figure we're just making up for lost time, since those first six or seven months after a baby are kind of a wasteland that way.
Happy Weekend!

This and That

**If you want to talk to my mom, you're going to have to get through me first!"


1)This week I realized how much I appreciate the support of the people I work with:
Not that I don't love all of my patients, but there are certainly ones who tax more of the office staff's, um, resources.

And this week I was in the position to see one of those patient's. This patient had taxed about as much as he could tax without people (in every department) getting pretty hot under the collar. So when he was coming in on my schedule, and a certain foot needed to be put down about office policies, I had more back up than I could've hoped for.

It started with a text from one of our front desk people: "Hey, just a heads up, but so and so is on your schedule today." I was glad to know I wouldn't be blindsided by it that afternoon. Then as I walked in, the two unit secretaries let me know that they'd adjusted my schedule to help me deal with what would probably be an extended appointment.

As I stood on the nurses station, a few employees came over and rehearsed with me the best way to handle the situation. A fellow physician saw one of my patient's for me so that I had more time to get my game face on. My nurse offered to come knock on the door at an appointed time to see if I needed backup (I hope you are sensing that this was not a typical office visit...in fact, I don't think I've ever seen a patient who was so widely known by the staff!). Etc., etc., It felt like I was a gladiator being prepped for battle. And so by the time I was sitting across from the patient, I didn't feel stressed or anxious at all. Because it felt so good to know that outside my office door, there were dozens of people pulling for me and hoping it was going all right. That I had on the armor of goodwill and solidarity, and that everything would be just fine.

And it was.

2)That is how we spent our morning.

Both kids had their well-child visits today. Lil' Drummer didn't make a peep while his ears were examined (I enjoy this victory since I know how hard it can be to be the examiner) and Tiny Dancer impressed the doc with her knowledge of fairy tales. He declared Tiny dancer precocious and Lil' Drummer a lightweight. We need to get more meat on that kids' bones. And you know what's funny? Even though my office feels like a second home, I still have some of the same anxieties that everyone else does when I'm on the other side of the coin. I'll have to write more about that sometime.

3)This little darling is pretty fun to take shopping. I had a couple returns to make, and she wanted to carry my bags, and stop at every.single.bench (of which there were many) on the way out, to snap iphone pictures. I'm glad that her mall fascination right now centers around their escalators, and not their product lines. This is something that I know is bound to change in the coming years.





4)That article about dirty shopping carts makes me feel better. I mean, it makes me feel worse about the state of shopping carts, but better about my slightly OCD habits. Because you better believe that whenever I schlep the kids into Target or Trader Joe's with me, I wip out my personal supply of anti-bacterial wet wipes, and scrub the handles down. I try to do so as unobtrusively as possible, always wary that people think I'm some kind of crazy. But then I read this and I think, "I am NOT the crazy one!" So, ponder that next time you are at the grocery store, okay?

5)This dress that she's wearing?



Well, it's actually a tanktop, but the company accidentally sent me a size 6-7. I said to her, "Sweetie, It's too big. It's for a six year old." "No, Mom, it fits perfectly and it's for a three year old." She was devastated that I might exchange it for the proper size. And they're sold out of it now, so it's either, go with it as a tank dress, or abandon it altogether! What would you do?

Happy Weekend!

This and That

**This smile is one I rarely see in front of the camera from Tiny. Normally she srunches her eyes nearly closed. Apparently it takes my fabulous BFF, Nancy, to bring it out in her. Which means, clearly, that Nancy will have to be in all of our family photos from now on. Too bad she takes most of them. :)



**That concert was amazing. Seriously, if you haven't heard of "The Avett Brother", check them out. They move my soul. Rockstar laughs when I say this, but there is no irony in my voice!

**Does this phase look familiar to anyone else? Experiments in gravity!!







**This article certainly warrants consideration. I've long tried to avoid holding my cell phone close to my head, despite no consensus in the research about whether this is dangerous. This study quantified that something is happening, even if we don't know yet quite what. Part of why we keep our landline is so that we don't always have to use our cell phones for longer conversations at home. Until we know for sure what we're dealing with, it doesn't hurt to take precautions.

**That Rockstar is such a good breakfast-maker. If we have extra bread from dinner (like the whole wheat sourdough from last night), Rockstar likes to turn it into french toast instead of letting it turn to a too-hard-to-use waste.



**This one friend of mine gave me a great tip. She puts whipped cream on her kids' french toast or pancakes instead of syrup. It has way less sugar than syrup and seems just as exciting. We prefer to layer peanut butter, applesauce, and whipped cream.




**That kind of exuberance is what I want to aim for next week. And, you know, just in general.



**This face melts me into a puddle. And if you are wondering why most of my pictures of Lil' Drummer take place in his highchair, it might be because that's the only time he sits still long enough for me to snap a decent one. :)



Happy Weekend!

This and That

*This is what the inside of my brain feels like for a few months after I have a baby:





It takes a while to clear out spaces amongst all the thoughts and between all the fatigue that come swirling in with a new person (as it obviously takes me a while to surface from the hurricane of the morning routine and breakfast dishes). So when I went back to work when Lil' Drummer was 3 months old, you can understand that this was still a work in progress. Come to think of it, it still is. But I need an excuse for the following anecdote, as you will see.

A 3rd year medical student was shadowing me one morning. And running on a little sleep, I kept forgetting to grab my stethoscope off the nurses station before I went into a room. So as we'd go to examine a patient, I'd exclaim to the medical student, "Oh! I keep forgetting my stethoscope. Can I borrow yours?" "Sure," he'd say, and hand it over. This went on for 2 or 3 patient's. Finally, while we were standing outside of a room, he said to me, "You know, you're welcome to keep using my stethoscope, but yours is right there. In your pocket."

I looked down and sure enough, the stethoscope that I kept claiming not have, was sitting right there.

"Oh, right!" I said. And trying not to blush, I also decided not to think of what my patient's thought of my borrowing another stethoscope when mine was so obviously available. Maybe they thought it was some other piece of medical equipment sticking out of my pocket? One can only hope.


*That Lil' Drummer has required a lot of this today:


His teeth are bugging him and causing us to have a few nighttime interruptions the last few nights. But you know what? There's still no one I'd rather share a few cheerios with:







*This Valentine's Day Banner (or something akin to a banner...Tiny Dancer and I lost steam when it came to connecting our paper our hearts) makes my mantle so cheery. I'd like those hearts and those Tulips up for months. Can we pretend it's still 'Valentine's Day Season'?







*That party was rockin'. Too bad no one was invited except for me. The chef is divine--she serves innovative combinations like raw onion and green apple. Maple syrup is the key ingredient in everything.




*This article is a wake-up call for parents. It's really scary to hear how many crib related accidents and deaths there are. I know we'll be checking ours to make sure it's safe, and lowering it in an attempt keep Lil' Drummer inside. This little dude is already scaling his baby gates. And it gives me heartburn. :)

*Happy Weekend!*