The Doctor is In...and Out...and In...and Out

I think I blogged awhile ago about how I was getting ready for this roller coaster of a ride of life that we had coming up. Well, we're living the craziness right now and I am truly just trying to hold on. I hope this post doesn't sound like a long complaint, because I truly am supportive, and this is for Dave's future career and our family's future, but it's just the straight facts. Plus it doesn't help that I've had a crappy day and am just in a bad mood, so negativity seems to be oozing out of me at the moment. This is our life though and as with all of my posts, I want to journal about it.

Let's take a ride on the ins and outs of (the future) Dr. Kelly. So if you recall, Dave left in mid-October for NC. Between then and December 22nd (our anniversary, Happy 7th Baby!) he was home for a total of 9 days. Yes, at least we were together for a week over Thanksgiving on our trip. But still 9 days during the busiest (and fun) time of year. Here's where his adventures took him: 1 month in North Carolina, 1 day after we got home from Paris, he headed to LA to take part of the Step 2 medical boards, from LA he went to Richmond, Virginia to interview at VCU, and then he got home the night before Anna's birthday party. Just in time! Then he interviewed here at Utah (for the General Surgery program), Seattle, Cincinnati, Washington University (St. Louis), Northwestern (Chicago), and UC Davis. Most of these interviews are 2 days because they have a social the night before. And then at last he was home! We got to enjoy him (minus a few study days) for a whole week of Christmas fun! (Christmas post will come soon, Dave has the laptop with all of our pictures on it) And it all started up again on January 2nd when he left for Columbia, Missouri, then it was straight to Wisconsin. He got home in time to attend my lesson in Sunday School (only the 2nd one he's been able to come to!) and then he left on Tuesday to Rhode Island to interview at Brown. He's still there, but he leaves tomorrow to go to Ohio to interview at Case Western, and straight from there he goes to NYC for Mt. Siani. Then he's home for 2 days before he goes to WakeForest (NC), then straight to USC (LA) and back here to interview at Utah. Are you tired yet? He's home for a few days and then he goes to the OC to interview at UC Irvine and then he'll head to Vegas for an interview there too. It finally starts to slow down and he's deciding whether to cancel the 2 he has the following weekend in NYC at Columbia/Cornell and NYU. His last one is mid-February at Michigan State. Whew! That is a lot of interviews don't you think? (Yes, we have him enrolled in a frequent flier program, and yes, we have to pay for all of this travel!) We do feel lucky to have so many opportunities to interview. The more places he interviews, the better chance he has at matching somewhere. He actually had to turn down 8 programs because they like to interview on the same days as others, so they make you choose. Yes, so I recognize that this is a good problem to have, but whew! I'm tired and Dave's tired. I will be glad when this interviewing frenzy is over and I can go at least a month without driving to the airport. If you've seen me lately and you think I'm acting kind of crazy it's because I am. I seriously am. I am going to lose it soon I think. Anna is at hard stage for me right now. And I know all you veteran mothers will say, just wait for what's coming and wait until you have more kids, etc. I know, I know. But I am just feeling very challenged with her right now probably because she usually is pretty good. And I think I need to set up some sort of playgroup or Little Gym because she's so happy being with other kids and I think she gets sick of being stuck at home with me while I'm trying to work. Oh, and work. Yes, did I mention that I hate it? Thursday is technically supposed to be my day off, but instead, I have my daughter in front of Barney so that I can be on a conference call where my client is yelling, "Where the F- is my animated graphic!? Without this graphic everything else is SH-!" and so on. And for some reason my boss tells her that we're delivering it tomorrow which is nice of him since he hasn't done anything on this project and is cluesless and I have it scheduled with our vendor in LA to deliver on Tuesday. Nice. So you might be thinking this must be a really important cool graphic that is needed so desperately. Well, yes, it's very exciting. You see, it's an animated graphic that tries to explain the Extended Enterprise. It is being presented at a sales conference on Wednesday and then used by the Verizon Business sales force to try to convince people that they need to use Verizon Business to secure their enterprise. Wow. That is pretty darn exciting and important. I'm so glad that I got cussed out over that. This could save millions of lives after all, or maybe even cure cancer. Sorry, I told you I was in a bad mood. And I don't know how I even got on this tangent. Oh yes, I am going crazy. You see? now you have proof!

OK, now back to the subject of this post. Dave is interviewing all over the place for Residency next year and we sure hope he matches somewhere after all of this! I think he will, but he always cautions me that it's possible not to match, so I'll just be cautiously optimistic that he will match. But where? That is the question. I think that is also an underlying stress of mine because it's a weird feeling not knowing where you will be spending the next 5-7 years of your life. So, I have a poll in my side bar and you should vote on where you think we will go. The winner of the poll will receive the satisfaction of being right and all participants are invited to visit wherever we end up.

Sorry for the bad attitude. I'll try and be in a better mood tomorrow when I post my resolutions. And Dave if you're reading this on the road, I love you and good luck with your interviews! Sorry that you have a mental wife.