Long Time No See

It has been awhile… 4 months to be exact. Our little guy is now a little over 5 months old and a whopping 20 pounds! I love my little chubster. :-) I look at my last post and laugh as I talked about being slow getting back to “normalcy” (whatever that is). I’ve definitely discovered that what I once thought “normal” – with regards to my schedule, getting things done around the house, sleep, and well, pretty much everything – is not normal anymore. I’m figuring out my new normal. This has meant waking up at 7am (or earlier) exhausted because our little guy seems to hate sleep and wakes up a lot each night (coffee is now my best friend), possibly taking a nap with him which is usually only 45 minutes (sometimes less), playing with him and trying to soak in every moment of him at this age because as I know already the time is really flying by, and then trying to rush around the house during his second and third 45 minute naps to get done what I can around the house, which despite my best efforts is still a complete mess. I get the laundry caught up (mostly), although it tends to enjoy sitting on the couch for a week before it gets folded, but I figure at least we can dig through the clean, albeit wrinkly pile, for whatever we run out of, right?

This past week was PC’s fall break (which, I think, is my favorite part about the school he is going to). It has been glorious, but far too short as always. It used to be that I looked forward to his breaks solely because of being able to spend all day every day with him for an entire week. Now, although this is still largely what I look forward to, it also means an extra set of hands with Little Prince. PC took a couple days and installed a gorgeous laminate floor in our kitchen. It looks spectacular! The rest of the week has been spent relaxing, which equates to watching our current favorite show, taking family naps, and playing tag team with Little Prince to catch some zzz’s when we can. The only reason I’m able to write this little post is because my sleep-deprived husband is taking a nap with our little one.

I still can’t believe we have a son… I feel… so incredibly blessed to be entrusted with this little life. He is the most precious thing. He is currently sitting up by himself (for a little while anyways), laughing at any and everything, teething a lot (which is fun – NOT!), and thus is chewing on everything. He is also fascinated with food. He watches PC and me eat with such intent and excitement as his little mouth moves as if he is eating too. I can’t wait to start him on solids.

It’s been a fast five months, but I’m loving being this kid’s mom, and I am so thankful I get to spend each day with him.

Happy Birthday, Prince Charming!!!

Today is my beloved husband’s birthday! These days we don’t do too much for birthdays (we both kind of lost excitement for our birthdays in the mid-teen years), but we try to make the day special with a couple gifts and a special dinner or something. I think I actually look forward to PC’s birthday more than he does because it feels like he gets closer to my age (yes, I am *cough* 2 ½ years older than him).

I always have the hardest time figuring out what to get him for his birthday – and really any holiday that involves gifts – mostly because he is a very content person and “doesn’t need anything” or “just wants” me (if you read my last post you’ll see that he is truly a romantic). If I’m lucky I’ll get the name of a book that he would like (because he has so much spare time – not!) but sometimes I’m left to just figure out something I think he would enjoy.  It probably doesn’t help too that our anniversary is a mere week after his birthday… Poor guy. I feel like we kind of stole the thunder from his birthday.

Anyways, I digress – we celebrated his birthday this year with a homemade steak and potatoes dinner (his favorite – my man loves his meat!) over the weekend and just enjoyed being together and lounging around the house as we recovered from being sick the previous week. Of course today there will be cake and candles, but aside from that he has just been studying like any other day. I feel bad… I want to make his birthday special and out of the ordinary…I just feel so incredible blessed to be a part of his life and I want that to come through in everything, but especially on his birthday. :-)

So what have you all done to make your busy medical husband’s birthday special?

My Every-Day-Valentine

I’ve never been a huge fan of Valentine’s Day… Sure, as a kid I loved getting those little “Sweethearts” candy with cute messages on it, but now I see it more as just another over-commercialized holiday. And from a couples’ perspective, I don’t really like how it seems like all the pressure is on the guy to do the wooing, gifting, romancing, etc. Too many women, I think, base their husband’s/boyfriend’s love for them on how well he performs on Valentine’s Day. I mean, c’mon, it’s just one day out of the year! My husband and I see Valentine’s Day more as just an excuse to go out and be with each other than anything else. Now before you write me off as a complete Grinch, please read on…

Now don’t get me wrong – I like flowers, cards, etc. from my husband just as much as any other girl. But why should the expression of love be limited to (or rather focused excessively on) only one day a year? Little things like chocolates and flowers are definitely nice every once in a while, but more than that I appreciate the day in and day out love that PC shows me. He is always kind, encouraging, gentle, and loving toward me. Whether it’s showing appreciation for the measly dinner I made, listening to my hormonal-driven rants and vents, washing the dishes after dinner (we don’t have a dishwasher), or just holding me whenever I just need him (even if it means not getting done as much studying as he would like), he is constantly showing his love for me. This, to me, is true love. And I am blessed beyond words to belong to my Prince Charming.

Now it would be a lie to say that we didn’t “celebrate” Valentine’s Day at all – We usually just keep it simple with dinner and an exchange of cards or something, but this year we decided to go all out and go to a really nice dinner at the Melting Pot (yes, this is about as fancy as it gets for us). With Baby coming soon we knew this would probably be the last time for a while that we would be able to enjoy an extravagant romantic dinner, so we just did it! PC actually had the entire day off of classes – we couldn’t figure out why in the world he would get Valentine’s Day off of all the holidays, but figured it had to do with Loyola being a Jesuit school maybe? At any rate, we’ll take it! So we had a wonderful, relaxing day together and that evening enjoyed a delicious, romantic dinner, and exchanged our cards (actually for Valentine’s and our anniversary he writes me the most romantic letters you can imagine. Yes, he is quite the eloquent Romeo with these letters and leaves me breathless after reading them). So even though I’m not the biggest fan of the holiday itself, I am a huge fan of being with my Every-Day-Valentine and will take any excuse I can get to do so. :-)

Medical Monday: Best Granola Ever!

So this Medical Monday I thought I would share the recipe I use for homemade granola – especially since in the last month alone I have made *cough* three batches of it. Granola is so yummy, whether you eat it with milk, yogurt, or just plain, but it also can get pretty pricey for the good stuff. So after searching around online (thank you, pinterest) I found this recipe  from wallflour girl, and decided to give it a try. My husband and I loved it! Since then, I have actually tweaked it a little bit and added some extra ingredients that we really enjoy, as well as using a little extra of the liquid mixture, which made it more flavorful, clumpy and granola-like. So here is my version of the recipe:

Ingredients:

9 cups oats

1½ cups chopped nuts (we like almonds)

1 cup sweetened coconut 
3 cups brown sugar 

⅔ cup water

1 cup vegetable oil

½ cup maple syrup
2 teaspoons vanilla
4 teaspoons cinnamon
1-2 cups of dried cranberries (add more dried fruit if your heart desires!)

(The italicized ingredients make up the liquid mixture.)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Lightly grease two 9x13 pans  (you could also put tinfoil in the bottom before greasing for easier clean up!).
Place oats, nuts, and coconut in pan, and mix well.

In medium saucepan, heat brown sugar and water until it just begins to boil.

Turn off heat, then stir in oil, syrup, vanilla, and cinnamon.

Pour over oat mixture and stir until evenly coated. Oat mixture should be no more than 2 inches thick to ensure optimal crispiness.

Bake for 40-50 minutes or until golden brown, stirring every 15 minutes.

Let cool and add in desired dried fruit. Store in air-tight container.

And there you have it! I was surprised at how easy it is to make (and how delicious!) I will definitely be making my own granola from now on! On a side note, I have tried a recipe with a honey base, but it lacked the amazing flavor this one has, so for now we’re just keeping to this recipe. 

Just this last week finished off a whole batch! So needless to say, I will be making yet another batch at some point this week. :-)

The End of the Beginning

Prince Charming finished his first semester!!! Last week was pretty busy with his studies, but this week has been nice with minimal late night studying (I think PC was just done with school) :-). Now it’s time for a much-deserved (and needed!) break. We leave this evening for a wonderful two weeks home with our families. I started to point out that PC is already 1/8 of the way to being a doctor, but that just seems depressing considering how long we have left. So I think I’ll stick to keeping track by the year. ;-)

I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas!

Baby on My Mind

Prince Charming and I are expecting our first child in April next year. We are so incredibly excited to start this next chapter! I think it is interesting that, when discussing with others the timing of when to have children during this long process to become a doctor, they would always assume that we would wait until after medical school to start our family. Well, PC and I have been married for a year and a half, and for the last year or so we had been planning on trying to conceive when we moved to Chicago. I totally understand those who prefer to wait until further down the road of the medical life, but that just wasn’t for us.

The main reason people gave to wait on children was of course finances. Babies are expensive–and they seem to get more expensive the older they get. However, we’re going to be “poor” throughout the four years of med school, and even when he actually earns a paycheck during the four-plus years in residency, it won’t be much. So that would put us at least eight years down the road, in our thirties, with only a dog or two as our family. Again, I’m not judging; this just isn’t for us. The truth of the matter is simply that there really is no good time to have a child. It will come with difficulties no matter what stage of life you’re in. So we figured we’d rather start early.

Along the line of finances, I have been researching a lot about ways to save money with a baby. My biggest find: Cloth diapers. It’s amazing how much money you can save just by using cloth diapers! I’ve seen a bunch of different figures, but basically from birth to potty training disposable diapers will cost about $2,000. Crazy, right?! And that is obviously per child. So imagine having two little ones in diapers at the same time and that quickly gets insanely expensive. For cloth diapering, depending on the system you use it can cost as little as $250 up to about $800 or so for the top of the line cloth diapers (which is still a significant savings!). And best of all, you can use your cloth diapers for the next child or two as well. So your savings multiply! I used to think that cloth diapering was only for environmental tree-huggers or ultra-conservatives, and although they are obviously better for the environment, that certainly isn’t the case. In fact, cloth diapering is becoming more and more of a trend among younger mothers. If anyone is interested in learning more about cloth diapering, I got most of my information from a cloth diaper vlog by Obbs and Lala. So, needless to say, I’m excited to get my cloth diaper stash and start using them on our little baby come April.

On a side note, and completely unrelated to the rest of this post, we get to find out if we’re having a boy or girl next Friday! We’ve had baby names picked out since way before I even got pregnant, so we’re eager to be able to start calling baby by name. My mom is also flying out next week for about five days and will be coming to our appointment with us. Thus, I am excited on all fronts for the upcoming week!

On Guinea Pigs

A sort of rite of passage for the medical student is dissecting a cadaver. For the medical wife I would argue that we also have a rite of passage: being the guinea pig when our husbands are learning the physical exam. Every medical wife knows exactly what I’m talking about. Your husband comes home excitedly and wants to look in all manner of orifices in your head. At that moment, you become a guinea pig.

In my case, I didn’t become a guinea pig suddenly. No, it was very gradual. My husband and I would be talking and then I notice him looking intently at my eyes in a suspicious way. Or we would be hugging and suddenly he would tug on my ear for a better look. Or we would be holding hands and he would look fixedly at my forearm and hand, while at the same time I can literally see him reciting the muscles in his head.

Then once they start learning how to use all their various instruments, you’re really in for it. I was just about blinded when he did an eye exam before PC realized he could adjust the brightness of his ophthalmoscope.  Then he would tug my ear in various directions trying to find my deeply embedded eardrum. Then of course, he had to look up my nose (that’s not embarrassing). And finally in my mouth (don’t do this after eating).

I actually genuinely enjoy “helping” PC in this way. So often I feel helpless as he stays up til all hours and rigorously studies, so it’s nice to help in this seemingly insignificant way.  So I embrace my guinea pig-ness and look forward to “helping” when I can.

Learning the Importance of Community

I’ve never really been a social butterfly. Like at all. But at the same time I also don’t like to be alone. I’ve never been one to put myself out there and introduce myself to people, but I knew once we moved across the country that would probably have to change. I knew that moving to 2,000 miles from home would be difficult – I had never lived away from my family. Even after Prince Charming and I got married we lived within 5 miles of my family. My mom is my best friend (aside from my Prince of course), and I have two younger brothers who are 7 and 13, whom I absolutely adore. We have a special sibling relationship, possibly because of the age difference, or possibly because they’re so irresistibly cute (I mean “handsome”) or just because they have the most tender, loving hearts. In any case, I knew I would, and most definitely do, miss them terribly.

Even after we got married and my husband was at work in the evenings (which if you’ve read my previous post, happened quite a bit) I was able to just go over to my family’s house for dinner or just spend time with them. But moving to the other side of the country I knew that if I wasn’t proactive in finding friends, I would truly be alone. For the truth of the matter is, no matter how much PC wants to spend time with me, sometimes (or a lot of times) he just can’t. Nope, I was kind of on my own to find company on the lonely days/nights that PC was unavoidably busy.

I had previously heard of the Christian Medical and Dental Association (CMDA), and about a month before we moved I started perusing their website to see what I could find. I came across a ministry for doctors’ wives called Side by Side(SBS). “Perfect!” I thought. Although I knew we would probably meet people at whatever church we ended up attending, I really wanted to meet other medical wives, because truth be told, most women in “ordinary” marriages don’t really understand what it’s like to be married to medicine. And I really wanted to glean from others’ experiences and fellowship with women in the same (or at the very least similar) circumstances, as much as I could. So I messaged the Chicago group on their facebook page. I didn’t hear anything back, and subsequently kind of forgot about it with the business of the move and then getting settled in to our new home. About a week after we arrived, though, one of the members finally responded to my message (the group apparently doesn’t use facebook very much for communication). After emailing back and forth a couple times she suggested getting together for lunch. Since then we’ve met a couple other times for lunch or going to the Science Museum. I have really appreciated her reaching out to me, and love spending time and talking with her about medical school life, and she has three of the cutest little girls. Her husband is in his 4^th year of residency (of 5 years) so she definitely has a lot of experience and wisdom. I’ve come to really look up to her as someone I would like to emulate and look forward to spending more time with her throughout the next couple years.

The SBS group has only met once since I’ve been here (usually we’ll meet twice a month), but it was so refreshing to talk to other women whose husbands are in med school/residency. The group is led by two women about 55-ish (their husbands obviously are already doctors). At the first meeting one of the women was telling those of us who were new to the group what SBS is all about and she mentioned how they want to be available for the rest of us to call up whenever we need something or just want to talk. As she was talking about this she said, “Because we know what it’s like to never see our husband, and even when he is home, he’s not really there.” “Yes!”  I thought, “That’s exactly how I feel!” So I’m really looking forward to getting to know these women and walking through this journey with them, and probably even make some life-long friends.

My husband and I have also connected to a church and joined a Gospel Community (basically smaller groups of people from the church that meet weekly). This has also been very refreshing and much needed. I definitely feel as though I have a good solid network of people to talk to, spend time with, learn from, and just live life with. Moving across the country knowing absolutely no one, especially with PC being so busy all the time, has taught me the importance of community. And I hope to broaden my community even more by entering the blogging world of medical wives.

A Little Background Leading Up to Now

My husband (whom I will refer to as Prince Charming or PC) and I got married at the end of the third year of his undergrad studies – March of 2012 to be exact. It was a busy time as I was working full-time as a dental hygienist, and he was studying to finish his biology degree, studying for the MCAT (which he took in May 2012), nervously applying to medical schools, and finally going on interviews to various schools.

During this time he was also working as a scribe (basically a person who writes doctor’s notes for them) in the Emergency Department of a hospital about 40 minutes from our house. That summer was especially busy as he picked up an additional training job (with the same company), while taking summer classes and getting his AMCAS application ready. It was a difficult time to say the least. I would get home from work physically and emotionally exhausted, and he would either already be gone for work or getting a few hours rest before he went in for a late shift. For a while we didn’t see much of each other. After a month or so of this my PC decided to dramatically cut back on work shifts so we could spend more time together, for which I was very grateful. 

In the fall, PC ended up interviewing for about 5 weeks straight during September/October. This was another difficult season. We hate being apart… Even when I don’t see him until the end of the day we miss each other terribly, but when we didn’t see each other for a couple days, well, let’s just say we texted a LOT. We were definitely glad for this season to be over. Then came the waiting.

Every medical student-to-be goes through this – the uneasy, anxious time of waiting for an acceptance. Being the neurotic individuals most of them are most definitely does not help. And the more time that lapses without an acceptance the more their mind has to conjure up doubts. The first day schools are able to send out acceptances, October 15, came and went with no news. My poor husband was disappointed as the day went on further and further without hearing anything, but only a couple of the schools he interviewed at gave acceptances this early anyways, and we kept reminding ourselves that God is in control and He hasn’t brought PC this far just to laugh at our disappointment of not getting in at all. I did my best to remind him of this, but in all honesty I was about as nervous as he was.

The first acceptance came on October 24^th from Wayne State in Detroit. Of the six or so schools that he interviewed at, this was our least favorite, but we were incredibly grateful to finally get an acceptance. PC wasn’t crazy about the 9-5 class schedule, equating to late nights, and when he told me about the area surrounding the school, I wasn’t a big fan either. But in any case we were officially going to medical school! This led to a profound sense of relief as well as hope that perhaps some of the other schools would provide an acceptance as well. The next acceptance was from Saint Louis, followed by Loyola Stritch, located in Chicago. 

Loyola was our favored school. During his interview there, this school really stood out to PC because of the welcoming, friendly staff who contributed to the laid-back, calming atmosphere of the school. The curriculum and class schedule (getting done with class earlier in the day to allow for more studying at home – and more time with me!) were also nice, and of course the option to use their amazing gym (which is one of the big “selling points” of Loyola) was also a plus. Moreover when he interviewed here, the interview groups were very small compared to other schools, only four other people were in his group. He really appreciated this because he felt more like a valued potential student rather than a cow being herded through the school – this left him with a sense of warmth and belonging.

The first day Loyola would send out acceptances for his interview time was October 29^th. Yet again the nerves, the apprehension, the excitement welled up inside us – feelings which, by this point, you’d think we’d be accustomed to. That evening for dinner we were planning on going to our favorite 60’s-themed diner for dinner regardless of what we heard (or didn’t hear!), but first we had to stop off at a store. After 5:00 pm Chicago time came and went (we were on Pacific time), we kind of gave up hope of hearing anything that day. But as we were checking out, PC received a call from an out-of-state number. Ethan looked at me excitedly and exclaimed, “Loyola!” He then stepped out of the store as I anxiously finished the transaction. A minute later he came back through the doors with a smile on his face and said, “I was accepted!” We were so thrilled we hugged and kissed right in front of the clerk. “We’re going to Chicago!” I said excitedly. The clerk even congratulated us before we were on our way to our celebratory dinner. 

After that life trotted by at a seemingly slow pace. We knew where we were going, and now we just wanted to start this new adventure! PC received a couple more acceptances but we were still pretty set on going to Loyola. In April of this year we attended the “second look” event at Loyola so I could tour the school and, more importantly, so we could try to find a place to rent when we moved there in July. The second look was an all-day event on Friday. I won’t bore you with every little detail of the day, but I will say that we left knowing without a shadow of a doubt that this was the perfect place for us. I was blown away by the friendliness of the faculty and passion and kindness of the students. One of the faculty even somehow remembered my husband by name! It was obvious the faculty genuinely cared for people – and not just the students. They have many social activities and such for spouses and families too. This is one thing I really appreciated. PC already kind of had a social network built in to his class of roughly 160 students, but I knew that I would really need to make an effort to meet people and make friends so I wouldn’t be completely lonesome when PC was busy all the time studying. I actually did end up meeting a woman whose husband was also considering Loyola. In the afternoon they split the potential students and their families up for a kind of Q&A session. When I entered the room I searched for a married-looking woman around my age to sit next to in hopes of us having things in common. Lo and behold, I found her. (And as it turned out PC ended up randomly sitting next to her husband. Talk about Providential!) Anyways, we spent a good deal of the day with her and her husband before heading back to the hotel. 

That weekend we also spent a lot of time on Craigslist looking for rentals and setting up tours. Although we were hoping find a home, we weren’t really counting on being able to secure anything since our move was still a ways off. Our first tour was of a little house about a mile from the school. We almost didn’t set up a tour because it was a little out of our price range – a price range that was unrealistic for the Chicago area we soon realized – but thought we might as well look at it. We absolutely fell in love with the little house and later that night asked if we could be their next tenants. We signed the rental papers the next day and were all set to come back in July.

July came and we packed all of our earthly possessions into a 16-foot Penske truck and began our 4-day trek across the country. My husband’s parents and grandfather actually came with us to help us get unpacked and settled in, which was a huge blessing, and kind of eased us into our new life here in Chicago.

And that pretty much catches us up to the present for the most part. My husband started school at a running pace and has been studying pretty much non-stop ever since. It’s definitely been an adjustment, but more to come on that subject and more later.