This whole thing speaks to me as the partner of a resident. Especially the bits about simultaneously feeling responsible for maintaining the day-to-day home, her emotional care, and if I can get around to it, my emotional needs, all while understanding that it's not really anyone's fault and so i can't actually get mad about it.
I’m a PA and wife of a neurosurgery resident. I felt the part about “feeling like your job is less important” SO DEEP IN MY SOUL. My clinic would literally have to shut down completely if I had to leave early for a child being sick, but somehow his job is still “more important” because he’s the doctor, so I’m the one stuck dealing with all the issues at home because my patients will keep being sick if I can’t get to work but his patients die if he can’t get to work (even though he has 8 other residents and a bunch of PAs and attendings who can do the work for him if he can’t go). It’s very frustrating.
Dad was a family doctor (who did house calls), so I got free medicine and healthcare… in our community, doctors gave families of other doctors professional courtesy. So, when I went to college and had to copay to get bad medical care,, i was shocked at cost.
I still recall a conference MD relating the story of being suddenly offered a specialized training across the country and calling his wife to say he'd be late for dinner. When she asked " How late?"... he replied "Two WEEKS!".
One of my ophthalmology coworkers who was a bit older than me had an interesting story about the importance of checking patient identity. He had a patient in the operating table with the hospital gown, their eye dilated and their head attached to the table with sticky tape. He always rechecked which eye was getting the cataract operation so he asked again and the answer was: - Oh, no. I just came to accompany my spouse. The nurses told me to out on the gown and I did. They told me to put on these drops and I did. They told me to get on the table.... You can imagine how relieved he was of having checked. The patient was about to have their spouse's intraocular lens implanted 😅
I don't dispute if residency is hell, but I do question the efficacy of such hazing as well as wonder how much this contributes to dissuading talented people from medical professions because they don't wish to sacrifice their personal life to their profession.
Medicine practice is consuming holistically & drains thinking about giving to Family - UNLESS there is excellent communication to recognize DAILY the holistically consuming & draining support of the Partner/Spouse/Family ongoing. Family Prayer helps a lot.
You guys should get in touch with Dr. Sydney Justin McElroy from the Sawbones podcast. I think you guys would hit it off pretty well. They talk about medical history and misconceptions.
It's not just that these conversations were not had. It's also that in patriarchy-affected systems, social work is traditionally dubbed "female" and "non-profit", cause ofcourse people with social consciousness are the easiest to exploit. Because ppl literally die if they do not comply. Meanwhile the expectations on workers and workload, is traditionally literally built for ppl who are male and single, childless or have a full-time unpaid home-maker woman enabling the function on the work field. If people actually considered women when building modern (industrialization+) work culture, then work hours would align with childcare, single people would automatically be most likely expected to preferably choose from the work hours that enable parenting, pregnancy AND parenting AND child sick leaves would be paid and even considered a social duty (aka ppl would likely call out anyone, who dares turn up to work during any of that, regardless of gender). IF there would be rifts between appreciation of work fields, especially monetary, then the least paid work fields would be those, that contribute the least to social life .... in a SOCIETY, you know? :'D And it sure as heck would not just be normalized that some do not choose children, but it'd be regarded "considerate" and seen as part of childcare, to attend to work and adult people's needs, so they can raise future society members and workforce. In the past, at the very least there were many places that actually accounted for family and accounted for children and home-makers needing feeding. Now we often see families that cannot get by without two working adults, while work expectations are still "children & private life who???" and home-maker expectations still not split between both, accordingly. And if we talk America then it's even "pregnancy who??" It's 2024. More ppl than ever are aware that the system is set up in utterly dysfunctional inhumane manner. Yet, the amount of resistance crashing into anyone who dares to to even pull these dynamics to attention is .... .... frankly, for supposedly being such a "smart" species, we sure can be very pathetic :'D So yes, absolutely all of us have power. It starts by how we comment on our co-workers and their needs. Or how we ourselves have self-destructive normalized narratives in our heads and can get subconsciously resentful towards others, as a result of it. It does not even require to lift a finger to make change happen, on the matter.
absolutely. unfortunately it seems like work-life balance is so far away, when many people are struggling for the basics. All people can ask for is to pay the bills. I think all careers should have shorter hours, let us finally take advantage of automation and have more time for living. Especially with global warming creating more extreme weather, shouldn't we at least be able to enjoy the few nice days we will still have? But medicine seems to be especially brutal. I also heard that academia, the path to becoming a professor, is also geared towards the standard of "man with full time homemaker wife." And with more women in academia, we've coincidentally moved from tenured professors to exploited TA's and associate professors and such. We need less time at work and more time living and If worker power keeps growing, maybe we can get there.
I'm a psych RN working on my PMHNP, and my wife is a LCSW. Our kid(s) are either going to be well rounded when it comes to health, or totally fucked up, there is no in-between.
Yes, i's hard for families of residents, but isn't knowing your family will have an income of hundreds of thousands of dollars a year make it easier to dig in for 4-5 years until you get that HUGE payday for 40 years?
I would say VERY gradually increase activity and calorie intake? But most of all talk with a dietitian or other professional who can build a plan for your specific body type and lifestyle.
Mum's a retired nurse, Dad's a retired GP; it's great being able to speak medical on many levels, not least because if I am seeing a specialist, and rhey don't know my background, I know when they are humouring me, or when they try to pretend it's serious. I also have a more realistic idea of outcomes which is useful (if grim) at times
I usually love these discussions but this one was kinda infuriating. It really was a whine fest esp with Kristin. I’ve never had this experience, but many careers require a lot of sacrifice in the short term to reap the benefits later. Also, you must have known that residency is very demanding and difficult. You can’t always control your training requirements. Why not control what you can like maybe delaying starting a family while the dr is in training. Idk but this episode really got under my skin. People make decisions but then complain later on about how put out they were. Ungrateful and entitled.
I agree. Also noting all the whining in episodes about being a "co-patient." You get to be a certain age and bad stuff has happened to everyone. Like she's the only one, and she's still carrying on about it almost 4 years after the actual patient's cardiac arrest. Me, me, me.
I feel like you two should maybe stop listening to this podcast if that's how you feel about Kristin. We know that they read their reviews as they often read them out loud. I am sure she would be upset to read your comments. Firstly, she is totally valid to complain about these things. It doesn't matter if it applies to other fields. No job or training should mean someone doesn't have time to spend with their partner or children. Also, she and Hayley are literally doing work to make the situation better, and not just complaining about it. I wonder if you also considered it whining during Will's "30 days of US Healthcare" videos which were specifically made to complain how shitty the US system is.
@@0freezinghot0 "30 Days of US Healthcare" points out the extreme shortcomings of a human-made corrupt system that needs total overhaul. That's not whining. It's a public service. Creating a new word to describe and perhaps market an experience that has been part of the human condition for time immemorial is not the same thing. I really enjoy the various Glaucomflecken productions but happen to find that one small part to not be my cup of tea. It's silly to suggest "maybe stop listening" for having a different opinion about one lesser aspect of the productions.
You have yet to comment on the ongoing targeting of medical personnel and facilities in Palestine, despite it being U.S. funded and hence involving us. If you wish to be an agent of change in medicine you cannot be willfully ignorant. You must stand against genocide! You must stand against 150-300 dead per day. You must stand against the imprisonment and torture of medical staff. Silence is compliance and at this rate you are no better than the AMA 🇵🇸
