Finding the Balance--2

**Balancing toddlerhood and effortless cool.**

*Choose the right partner. I say this partially tongue-in-cheek, but if you know you are going into medicine, be honest about what that might mean with your future spouse. I had a friend in college whose boyfriend was a little worried about what the medical training road looked like. At the time, I thought it was sort of funny how he did a lot of research, and interviewed people who’d been down the road to decide if he was up for it. I mean, when you’re 21, that doesn’t sound very romantic. Love is love, right? Looking back, I realize how smart he was. He found out what the road would entail for both of them, and decided he could commit to it. They got married and have navigated the ensuing road as a team. Also, if you are both pursuing time-intensive careers, communicate honestly about how you plan to merge those paths, or who is going to compromise, and when. Better some upfront discussions and research than down the road bitterness.

*Take care of your spouse: We've established that the partner sacrifices a lot in the pursuit of the medical dream. But it's important not to become so myopic in that intensity, that you forget there are lots of little ways you can pamper your spouse. A love note under the pillow, a quick phone call, a surprise donut pick-up on your way home--things don't need to take a long time to have an impact. Let your spouse know that they aren't unappreciated or forgotten in the long hours and sleep deprivation. Medicine can make you tired, but it doesn't have to make you a narcissist. :)


**You've gotta love a partner who can find the right anniversary card. Rockstar says those boots are the pre-cursor to Uggs. And I'm totally buying him some. Happy Anniversary to the man who has carried me through many a difficult thing!**


Bonus Round: Here's what I love about the people I work with. After a month of my co-workers analyzing the utter insanity of a certain reality TV show, I walked in one morning to find the following on my bulletin board(both relating to said reality show's finale that aired this week).





It definitely had me smiling as I walked into the first room of the day.

**Thanks to those who left comments on my last post--they gave me food for thought as I write these posts!**

Top 5 Friday

I'm not calling this Top 5 Friday because I intend to make this a recurring thing (though you never know!), but I do just so happen to have five things to share with you before the weekend. Hopefully when things slow down after Christmas, I'll have more time to actually sit and write. In the meantime:

1)This is a little video I put together that will help you see how much my little man lives up to his nickname. His nickname was serendipitous. Cause how could I have known a year ago just how much of his Dad's percussion gene he had inherited?



2)Green Shake Recipe.



We've become enamored of green shakes lately. They taste so delicious and it's one of the only way to get Tiny to eat lettuce of any sort. My fabulous sister gave me her recipe to try, and it's a hit with all members of the househould. I attribute this in large part to the fact that it tastes like a pina colada. Type 'green shake' into pinterest, and you'll get lots of ideas, but here's what we've been drinking:
2-3 handfuls of spinach
Some water or OJ as a liquid base
Frozen mango and pineapple
1 tsp Vanilla
1 T Coconut Oil

Blend and enjoy! I don't have a fancy blender, and it still blends the spinach completely. I think I'm partly drawn to green shakes this time of year because I'm looking for anything with immune boosting effects. Oh, cold and flu season!

3)My new favorite Christmas Album. I just discovered this today. Design Mom mentioned it and I went and checked it out. I listened once and SOLD! I knew Rockstar would love it as soon as I heard the pianist has been compared to Vince Gauraldi. The featured vocalist, Acacia, has a fantastic jazz voice.

My other new favorite Christmas Album. Rockstar bought this for me last week, and it's been in near constant rotation. When I first heard Zooey Deschanel's voice in 'Elf', I remember thinking, "Why isn't this girl making music?? I'd so buy her album." I googled it, and found out that at the time, she was popular on the Hollywood party circiut as a singer. I'm glad that she's made albums now that we can all enjoy.

4)This article is worth a read. A good friend and I were talking this morning about what parents can do to help kids grown into more respectful teenagers. She pointed me towards this article, and I thought it made so much sense. I really believe that the kind of love, generosity and respect we model in our marriage will be pivotal in our children's behavior. Just last week we had a family night lesson about being nice when other kids aren't(geared toward the preschool set). Afterwards, Tiny was playing with her toys while I recounted a story from the day to Rockstar, including a semi-sarcastic thing someone had said. Tiny pipes up, "Mommy! You can't talk to Daddy like that! We just had a lesson being nice, and you need to be nice!" We were cracking up as I explained that I was just relaying a story, but holy little pitchers! These little ones don't miss a trick. It was a good reminder to make a more concerted effort in the generosity department.

5)DIY Chandelier



I don't really consider myself a DIY'er, but I was helping out with the Halloween party for our church this year. The main planner came up to me while we were setting up and said, 'Hey, do you think you could build a chandelier in the middle of the ceiling with all these paper lanterns?' And because that is just precisely the kind of nebulous challenge that I love (the kind where I don't really know what I'm doing out the outset), I said yes. An hour and a half and a lot of fishing wire/masking tape/twinkle lights later, my friend Jen and I felt pretty pleased with our efforts. I'd give you a step by step on how we did that, but I'm not really sure!

Happy Weekend!

Digging Deeper

**In not finding the toy he was looking for, he threw his hands up in the air.**


"Drat!" I thought. Because when I looked next to the patient's lab result, I was hoping to see a yellow triangle that would indicate that something on the labwork was flagged as abnormal. But I saw nothing. And while I generally hope for good news and clean reports, sometimes I am looking for something to explain the situation. I am looking for the answer. And no yellow triangle means no easy answer.

When the symptoms are particularly nebulous, and the question of where to go next is somewhat daunting, it is easy to want to give up. To say, "Well, your blood work looks fine." The end. But, of course, you can't do that.

So, we wait, my patients and I, to see how the problem evolves. We keep digging. We 'monitor symptoms.' I re-examine them. I ask more questions. I ask specialists for their opinions. We re-check the blood, looking for other possibilities.

And usually, one of two things happens:

1)The problem resolves itself. Tincture of time, or change of situation, or the body just healing itself.

2)Our further investigation yields the result. And the harder it was to find, the more satisfying it is to fix. Or to understand. Or what-have-you.

And I think the same type of thing happens in life outside the doctor's office. Sometimes there is a problem we can't quite put our finger on, but something feels off: a relationship, a child, or a mood. And upon our initial scan of possible root causes, nothing obvious comes up.

It is tempting, I think, to say, 'well, whatever. I guess we just aren't clicking.' Or, 'I guess I'm just feeling off.' Or, 'I guess my kid is just in a phase.' But I've learned that it is worth it to press on in our search to understand why we are feeling how we are, or why we are relating to others the way we are, so we can heal those relationships and heal those parts of ourselves.

Because even just the exercise of looking for solutions, shows that you think the cause is worthy of your time and concern. And just as a patient appreciates when I don't brush them off when their issues have become difficult to understand, those we love do too.

Sometimes, I think, just taking that time to understand is what opens up the way for things to heal themselves. But other times we ultimately stumbles across that yellow triangle, and with a sigh of relief and satisfaction, set about fixing the problem.

*If you are getting frustrated in your quest for answers, try a little pit-stop for Mickey Mouse Pancakes. They do wonders in our household.**


P.S. I love this talk on healing given by a former dean of nursing.

If I Forget, You Remember

I glanced at my schedule and saw that my 10:00 same-day slot had been filled by an elderly patient. The complaint read, “worsening mental status.”

My nurse shook her head, “I’m not sure why they put him on your schedule. He normally sees Dr. W.”

I tried not to think about the fact that this (a complicated patient unfamiliar to me) would surely cause me to run behind for my last five patients. When 10:00 rolled around, I reviewed his chart. I could see that this patient had an advanced case of dementia, which was surprising as he was only in his 60’s.

I walked in the room and was greeted by the patient and his lovely wife. He was well-groomed and pleasant. Only upon direct questioning did his memory problems become apparent. He smiled at me, complied with my exam, and deferred to his wife when she began talking about his recent issues.

She, too, was exceptionally well put together. Her smile was radiant and full. She had a lightness about her that surprised me given their situation. Caregiving is not an easy task in any situation, and I imagine that that would only be compounded by the fact that your relatively young husband was the one slowly losing his grasp on your history.

She remained upbeat as she told me that his current state was reflective of how he was during the day, but that at night he was a much different person—angrier, more confused.

“Last week, he accidentally broke the kitchen door,” she confided.

I thought to myself, ‘Wow..sounds like things are getting pretty bad.’

But then they looked at each other and chuckled. Giggled. ‘Conspiratorial’ was the word that came to mind while watching them.

“Yup,” she said smiling, “We’re breaking doors now.” She goodnaturedly relayed the details of the accident, while he listened in.

And it struck me as the most amazing thing I’d seen all week.

How the power of their shared memory was overcoming the difficulty of a terrifying disease. How the love and the knowing that a long partnership creates, was enough to restore some of the deepest losses disease can inflict.

I thought about what a remarkable gift it is to give someone: to say, “If you forget, I’ll remember.” Even when the going gets rough.

Not all of us are faced with the body’s ability to betray us in such a way. But it seems to me that one of the most powerful things about having someone witness your life, is to say, ‘if I forget how I am when I’m not sleep deprived, you remember.”

Or: If you forget how you were before this illness or that stress, I’ll remember.

I guess the point is to still appreciate someone’s presence, even when life has altered the parts of them that we’d taken as permanent.

To accept, smile and move on. To laugh at the parts that can be laughed at. To deal bravely with new realities.

But always: to honor the past. To remember.