What a relief that I never have to relive that event again. Ever. My nerves can only handle so much excitement and drama.
I remember the absolute feelings of fear. Will he match? Will he match some where we want to live? Will it be close to our family? Will we know anyone? Will the people be nice? Will they have a Chipotle?
I had at least four different plans that had been previously worked out that were ready to be put into action the minute the news was received. I was probably a little over confident and had my heart set on one location in particular because it felt like home. Something about it seemed to call to me. Mind you I had never been in the state other than an airport layover years earlier. I had seen pictures that my husband had taken during his rotation and interview there. The location was far from home, and the climate was like nothing I had experienced before.
I knew before the match results were in that it was where we were going. We were supposed to be there. I could feel it in my bones.
Thankfully I wasn't disappointed, but I easily could have been. There are so many working parts to the match. Any one of them could have derailed our dreams. My husband assured me that he would match. But there is no guarantee than anyone will. We have good friends who didn't match the first time and had to scramble! Scrambling is about as much fun as the name implies.
We feel lucky that it worked out the way it did. The city we moved to was good for us in so many ways. We had been married for two years and had a small son. We grew up during residency, if that is possible for a pair of grown-ups to do. Rather we matured.
I am so excited for all the families who are starting this next adventure in the pursuit of medicine. Residency is about so much more than medical training. It is relationship and marriage refining. It is human development and social experimentation. It is strength AND endurance training.
I hope that you will look back on these years as some of the best of your life. I used to roll my eyes at the people who would say that about difficult years, but now that they are mostly behind me I can see what they mean. I wouldn't trade those 6 long years for anything:-)
P.S. They won't be the best because they are easy. Trust me, they won't be easy. They will be the best because you will discover who you are, what you are made of, and what you can do. Your husband will find that out for himself, too.
Congratulations!
I have anxiety and it is a year away for us. Although we are watching some of our friends going through it this year - so stressful. How anyone thought it would be a good idea to set up "match" the way they did are nuts haha. As much as I am trying to enjoy the here and now I will finally relax when we know where we will be for residency. Thank you for sharing a positive experience with match.
ReplyDeleteChey xo
I'll be going through the match next year and enjoyed reading your post :) I'm also encouraged to hear that although it was so difficult, you felt that you matured and grew in your relationship. I hope that it will be the same for my husband and I while I'm in residency.
ReplyDeleteMatch when we did it (2 years ago!?!? Whaaaa?) was pretty anti-climatic because we ended up staying where we were for med school (he wanted to stay, so we were pretty certain we were going to). I can see how it could be exciting though for others. I also feel like we haven't really gotten to "grow up" during residency either. I'm sure he has been growing into his new doctor life, but my life literally stayed the same. Same job. No kids. No home. It feels the same as med school to me. At least our residency is only 3 years, then we'll have fellowship for another 3 (another match...).
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful reflection and I must agree. We are only not even 2 years done with residency but I have learned so much about myself, him and us as a couple. We have grown so much and I know we will continue to keep doing so. Oh and girl I am on the same page with Chipotle! If they catered weddings, they would have done ours :) We love it.
ReplyDeleteAMEN to your last two paragraphs!! It is definitely a marathon. And as we get closer to the finish line I can't help but to get a little emotional about it. When we started almost 10 years ago, the 10 years seemed SO far away, almost impossible. Yet here we are with less than 5 months to go.
ReplyDeleteLove this! It is so true that residency makes you find out who you are as a person. They have been the best years of my life, and the absolute hardest.
ReplyDeleteI can't say these are the "best" years of my life as in easy, happy, joyous etc BUT when I look at pictures of me and my kids and the hubs we look QUITE happy, vibrant, young and in our "prime". (Thank you iphone for not showing my imperfections). We have two more years to go before this thirteen year journey is O-V-E-R. Match day was glorious for us. New start, new beginnings and we really needed that at that time in our life. We most certainly have grown up. Two kids, three years down and I constantly miss my husband but try to put on a brave face for my girls. What makes me so sad about residency is that this is when our kids are young and I wish hubs could be here more. General surgery is incredibly unforgiving. BUT, at least I'm learning how tough I am--even though I already knew I was kinda' tough (inner city teaching will bring it out in you). The best part of it all is that we are BONDING as a nuclear family. We are far from our childhood families which is good and bad. Distance makes the heart grow fonder, let me tell you. Thanks for such a lovely post. I'm hoping one of our new residents will have a cool wife and kids to befriend =) One can only hope!
ReplyDeleteOh my gosh! Remember this day like it was yesterday. Loved the post!
ReplyDeleteLove you PS note! So so so true!
ReplyDeleteThis is so true! Thank you for sharing.
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