Brunch views: 4.18.18 @willajeanneworleans
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“American has only three great cities: New York, San Francisco, and New Orleans. Everywhere else is Cleveland.”
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First: I don’t endorse the Cleveland dig. Second: life in New Orleans is beautiful. I am working on a scrapbook that chronicles my time in this city. Unsurprisingly, a lot of the photos look like this one: amazing food. Many photos are of my beautiful friends. Some photos capture the joy of sharing this city with visiting my best friends. Few photos capture the experience of being a student in a city that is largely a tourist destination.
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As a kiddo, I lived for our weekend getaways to Dallas, Houston, and New Orleans. The weekend trips to NOLA came to a screeching halt after Katrina but my love for the city persisted. I can’t even explain how excited I was to have the opportunity to live here.
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This city isn’t perfect by any means - please don’t get me started on politics in Louisiana 😂 - but the progress over the past couple of years is comforting. Day by day, New Orleans reminds me more and more of the city I first met as a kindergartener.
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As I pile my belongings into boxes and prepare to apartment hunt next week, I can’t help but wonder about what will be and what I will leave behind. But until I’m forced to leave this city, I’m knocking out my restaurant bucket list. ✌🏿
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#brunch #neworleans #nolafood #eaternola #gawkerfood #willajean #visitneworleans #foodphotography #foodgasm #foodie #huffpostfood #eater #vegetarian #thrillistnola #eatingnola
And just like that, medical school is over. The end of my 12 hour overnight ED shift serves also as the end of my clinical duties as a medical student. ✌🏿 Like woah - how crazy town is that?
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These past four years have been equal parts informative and irritating; beautiful and bothersome. I was asked if I would do this all again. I hesitated and then said “yes, but I’m glad I don’t have to....let’s just keep this thing moving.” And I meant (and still mean) it.
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Real talk: medical school isn’t easy. I won’t downplay it. Hours spent in the library were by no means the most challenging. These were the moments I found difficult: 1) when the patient who referred to me as his “adopted granddaughter” handed me his cell phone and asked me to explain metastatic multiple myeloma to his daughter because he “never learned how to speak coherently while crying,” 2) when my first adult patient passed away, 3) when my first pediatric patient passed away, 4) each time a patient shares his/her trauma history, 5) when a patient tells me nobody has ever /really/ listened before, and I could go on forever.
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I am grateful (of course) for my family and my friends. I feel like I never say this enough: they deserve medals for being so supportive of this absentee daughter/sister/friend.
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And what I need to say but can’t reasonably put into words: I am incredibly grateful to have the opportunity to learn from my patients, the privilege of being trusted with the most intimate of secrets, and the chance to see the spectrum of the human experience. The conversations about how racism, homophobia, and transphobia negatively impact the experience of POC and LGBTQ+ individuals in the healthcare system were impactful. The conversations about how to move past personal trauma were restorative. The times we linked hands to pray together changed my life. And when you said I can share your stories to help people and patients who were experiencing similar feelings of grief, pain, and hardship - you launched a series of stories and articles and reignited a part of me that was lost long ago.
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Forever indebted. Incredibly humbled. Entirely exhausted. Time for a nap. ♥️
July of last year, I asked one of my advisors if I should apply to institutions like Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) or BCRP or Cincinnati for my upcoming residency application cycle. And he looked at me and said: “Historically, people from Tulane do not match to CHOP or BCRP. And quite frankly, you aren’t junior AOA, so…if you wanna spend the money, I won’t stop you. But I just want you to be informed.” I talked to my parents and they were definitive: don’t change your list of schools. Don’t let your “advisor” limit you.
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25 applications, 25 interview invites, 16 interviews, 28 flights, 14 hours of road trips, and 3 train rides later: I matched. I’m going to be a intern at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, my first choice. The first choice that I ranked cautiously and with a guarded heart. I literally ugly cried all morning y’all - it was disgusting.
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Today I am grateful to my parents for believing in me when I could not. Today I am grateful to my sister and brother for being my never-ending emotional support. Today I am grateful to my friends who comforted me, encouraged me, called me when I was on my way to interviews, and talked me out of all the crazy self-deprecating things that I said as the stress of this interview season caught up to me.
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Some people see Match Day as the success of an individual. I don’t. I fully recognize that I could not have done this without all of you. Thank you for the love and support. We did it! We’re heading to Philadelphia!
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#CHOP #pediatrics #IPickedPeds #Match2018 #PEDSMatch2018 #MS4 #TulaneSOM #MatchDay
B L E S S E D .
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Six years ago, as I stood in a pediatric hematology/oncology ward, I realized that I want to be a pediatrician. Today, I received the email that confirmed that I will indeed be a pediatrician. 🙈
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I matched! 😭😭😭😭 But I won’t find out where I’m moving to until Friday 😬
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And to the dude who stopped me today with this rhyme/line “hey good looks, you know how to cook?” - I’ve got a whole job now!! Sugar daddy applications are null and void, BYEEEE 😂😂😂
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#Match2018 #PEDSMatch2018 #TulaneSOM #medicine #pediatrics #medschool #medicalstudent #nosugardaddiesnecessary #icantwerkforfree #thesehashtagsareamess
#personal: light meal (who can turn down a #salad with #avocado and #plantain?) paired with heavy conversation.
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I met with my undergraduate mentee for dinner tonight. After exchange pleasantries and talked about our love for colored hair, we entered more serious conversation.
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Let me start with this: she’s a bomb pre-medical student at HBCU. Last semester was rough for her, she explained. In the vortex of personal stress and academic turmoil, she found herself in a dark headspace. I told her that I could relate (can’t we all). But this is where our stories deviated: she said she felt this intense unspoken pressure from her family. She’s the first in her family to go to college and even more so the first to desire a doctoral degree.
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She found that this pressure couldn’t hold a candle to the weight of doubt. Doubt regarding whether she could make it through the semester. Doubt regarding whether she could even make it into medical school. She said that at times it’s hard for her to remember that women like her can be physicians. Sometimes it feels like she’s striving for something that she can never attain. And I wondered why women like her with almost perfect GPAs and wonderful personalities feel like they can’t enter this profession because of their race/ethnicity. And I wondered how long it will be before this comes to an end.
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She’s been signing her journal entries with Dr. “—-“ and although she admits that this may be silly, it has really helped her. I told her that I don’t think I’ve ever heard anything so amazing.
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This international women’s day, I hope we remember that our experience as women is nuanced, different. Our struggles are not the same. Nevertheless, our support for other women should be a given. Our love for one another should have no bounds.
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Tonight I met with her to talk about CVs and personal statements and MCAT preparation, and I meant to share my experience with her. Tonight, she inspired me and humbled me. She’s going to be a truly excellent physician.
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#internationalwomensday #premed #medicine #medschool #mentorship #NOLA #womensupportingwomen #storytellers
Current view: endocrine physiology. Next week, I get to facilitate an endocrine case-based learning session for the first year medical students. I’m super excited because I loved this block back in the day but, in all honesty, the motivation to re-familiarize myself with all the details, the hormones, and the feedback loops (ESPECIALLY the feedback loops) is low 😭🙃😬
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Cortisol bears the moniker of “stress hormone” and the CRH-ACTH-cortisol pathway, my friends, is the one pathway that requires no refresher. Cortisol and I are unfortunately well acquainted these days. This may come as a surprise, but I’m not stressed out about school (at least no more than usual). Over the weekend, I shared on my Instagram & snap stories a bit about my personal life...
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Brief recap: people can be extremely disappointing. 🐍 Major takeaway: medical students can be the most disappointing. 🐍🐍 Y’all’s response was overwhelming and encouraging in one sense..but also concerning.
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I mean how crazy is it that we’ve all found ourselves in a similar situation?
How crazy that we’ve dedicated our lives to a field of compassion and service, but we don’t receive that same compassion from our peers?
How crazy is it that when we have made decisions to let the people go who monopolize our time or compromise our happiness or scoff at our success or triumph in our tribulations or the humans who quite frankly deserve gold medals in manipulation and mental gymnastics...that they lash out?
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I wrapped up the weekend with a social media purge and entered a realm of legitimate peace. Bye snakes, fakes, and flakes. It’s been real.
Thank you guys for sharing your stories. Love you always 💫
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#personal #medicalschool #medschool #lifelessons #narratives #medicine #MS4 #endocrine #physiology #studyaesthetic #medlifecrisis #growth #writersofinstagram #medicalschool #medicine #journey #NOLA
For those of us participating in the #NRMP #match, today is a big day. Scrawled in all capital letters in the box attributed to February 21st is "submission day." In other words: rank lists are due. It's crazy to believe that in less than a month, we're going to find out: if we get our first job in medicine, whether or not we will have to move, and if we need to invest in a new wardrobe (like omg winter coats?). Pre-match anxiety is real (beyond real) and I've found myself re-reading my personal statement when I need a dose of reality, when I need a reminder of why I'm letting an algorithm decide my future, or when I need a source of motivation.
Some of you guys have reached out with questions about personal statements. My response: write something incredibly honest. I wanted to share a bit of my personal statement with y'all (the rest is posted on the blog, link in profile 🙌🏿). To all the fellow fourth years, hang in there my friends! .
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Her name was Isley and she was beautiful. She was two months and 28 days old when she was admitted to Lafayette Women’s and Children’s Hospital for respiratory distress. Her mother was young, no older than twenty-four years old, and appeared anxious: Isley was her first child and had only been out of the NICU for a few days prior to this hospital admission.
I found, when I examined Isley before rounds, that her condition was either unchanged or worse. One morning her mother asked me, “does she sound better?” I shook my head: “no, still very coarse.” Isley was on high flow oxygen at that time.
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“What does that mean even?” She sounded tired. I handed her my stethoscope and she listened to Isley. I let her listen to my breath sounds for comparison. “She doesn’t sound good,” she said. She sat down on the couch that served as her perch for the entirety of Isley’s stay. She never left. She was never accompanied. “Can I ask you something?”
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“Sure, anything. If I don’t know, you can ask my attending when she comes by in an hour or so.”
“Is this my fault? I mean, did I do something wrong?”
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I sat next to her on the couch and she held my hand as she cried.
(Continued on the blog ♥️)
#narrativemedicine #ERAS #ranklist #medicine
