The journey of a future doctor is not easy, there are no two ways around it. In an ideal world, you go through 4 years of college and get into a medical school where you spend 4 more years learning the foundations before launching into a residency which is 3 years at a minimum but up to 5 years depending on the field and specialty. Then, after that you just have a fellowship to conquer. In a super ideal world, you go to college so determined to be a doctor that you get into an accelerated program that has you through college and medical school in just 6-7 years compared to the traditional 8. 

Andrew took neither of these routes. After 4 years of undergrad, he completed 2 years in a masters program before beginning the 4-year medical school stint. Today, we’re working our way through his residency with a whole year under our belts, phew! This is all to set the scene and explain that everyone’s experience in medical school is different depending on the path you took to get there and the nature of your program. The differences on my end are what I will explain next, but always remember that experiences definitely vary and don’t be shy to send me a message so we can chat about yours! 🙂

Preface: I find it difficult to organize my thoughts on this topic because it covers SO much time and life. I tried to organize this into bullet points, but it didn’t come very naturally. I’m sorry for the lengthy explanation, but I am trying to be thorough.

Medical School

Medical school was quite the journey. That’s a great way to sum it all up in one short sentence. During Andrew’s four years of medical school we went through a lot of changes as a couple. We moved in together during his second year, we bought a house during the end of his third year, and we got married in the beginning of his fourth year. Tapping this all out now, it seems absolutely crazy, to be honest. But, medical school lent itself well to all of these changes. At the end of the day, medical school was just that – school. On my end, there were a lot of aspects that made it an easier time in our relationship.

Stress levels for Andrew (and in our house) through med school were what you would expect from anyone in college; higher before a test, lower after one. Like anyone else in any level of school, the homework meant that evenings and weekends were subject to being filled with work on assignments and might not always be “free.” On the flip side, just like any other field in college, the medical school planned student activities including formal events and parties. Medical school was, in a lot of ways, an easier time. The caveat being that the testing times were, in Andrew’s opinion, more stressful than any situation he’s experienced in residency because at the end of the day those were the hurdles that would make or break you when it came to the match. At that point, nothing was guaranteed and you had to prove yourself at every turn. 

Personally, being in a relationship while Andrew started med school was difficult. I was in my first job out of college making money, working 9-5:30 pm, and more in control of my life. It was hard for us to be on very different pages. Andrew was still very much in a collegiate atmosphere and was coming home with homework and needing to study – it was a weird combination because I was just living a totally different life. I definitely would get frustrated when I wanted to go out to dinner or spend time together and Andrew would have to bury his head in a book (or ipad) to study. The times leading up to tests were always the hardest. Knowing that he wanted to pursue orthopedic surgery and the level of competition in the field, Andrew took tests in med school seriously. After all, that’s how you get where you want to be and keep all of your options open. As you would imagine, home life during these study stints wasn’t fabulous. He was on edge and anxious and I would feel pretty much ignored for days on end. So yes, the testing in medical school was not enjoyable.

Another factor that made medical school challenging was the rotation aspect. Andrew did 3 away rotations over the summer (the summer leading up to our wedding!), and that was difficult. Of course, it was particularly difficult for me because it ran over the 2-3 months leading up to our wedding so I felt a little overwhelmed handling all of the wedding stuff and living alone in the new home we had just bought and fixed up. Honestly, it was a lot. I wound up standing in the Ikea parking lot alone because I was the last customer to leave the store and I was trying to load my Jetta with an insane amount of furniture by myself. Did I cry? HELL YES I CRIED. It was like a scene from a really pathetic romcom and I had, and still have, ZERO upper body strength. Not a highlight of my life. It’s not like I could take a hiatus from work to follow Andrew around to his away rotations, and honestly I wouldn’t have wanted to. He needed to be totally immersed in those programs to really learn, focus on the material, and decide if he would want to wind up there long term. It was hard at the time, but I’m glad he did it.

Finally, something that you do in medical school that you don’t do in residency is go through the match. That was hands-down the most difficult situation Andrew and I have handled in our marriage. The day of the match I wasn’t even really thinking about the outcome. I knew Andrew had matched, not because I actually knew, just because I knew it instinctively. Also, I had already purchased matching tshirts so obviously it was going to happen. I wasn’t prepared for the call from Andrew saying that he didn’t match. As a wife, it was the worst feeling I could have to hear Andrew on that call. There is no way, even as a spouse, to fully understand or appreciate all of the thoughts and feelings involved in the match process, so when we went through the scramble it was a real example of the strength of our marriage. If you want to know more about the match, I am going to write a full separate post about that so don’t worry! Suffice it to say, the whole ordeal was anything but a cakewalk and quite the way to top off the whole experience. So, how does this compare to residency? Well….

Residency

Residency is a literal term. Your spouse is about to become a resident in a hospital as in they will physically reside in a hospital instead of your home. I’m kind of kidding but also not really because that’s pretty accurate. Here’s the basic layout of residency for a resident: the first year is bad, the second year is absolute hell, the third year you start to feel like maybe you’re doing ok and life is looking up. As the other person in the relationship, this sets a clear expectation for what the five years will look like for you, too.

Residency isn’t school, it’s a job. The hours are more regular in the sense that there isn’t as much homework (don’t get me wrong, there still is some!) but it’s easier to plan days to go on dates or have a late night. Plus, all of a sudden your partner will have vacation days which is super exciting and even more exciting after you’ve gone through the first four months of their first year of residency and seen them go on-call for a 36 hour shift. 

Unlike medical school, there really isn’t homework or testing, outside of your Boards. Even though it isn’t truly homework, there is a lot of reading and some “Journal Club” events in the evenings. So, in some ways it’s actually worse than med school homework because it feels like it takes Andrew no less than 8 million years to read those dang articles and mark them up. 

Gone are the days of med school formals and booze cruises, instead you are completely at the mercy of your own creativity or the spouse group for your program, if it has one. More likely than not, your partner will have moved to complete their residency and, chances are you’ve now moved with them. This is also a big change because if you’ve moved to be with them and they’re not physically around the house, that’s a strange dynamic. So, you need to find friends. Some programs will have a spouses group that gets together for happy hours or other events. Other programs won’t, it all depends. If you’re in a committed relationship, hopefully your partner took you along on residency interviews so that you could do your own research on what programs were best suited for you as well. If your partner hasn’t gone on the interviews yet, definitely make sure you get to go. If you’re in a serious relationship, this move is just as much about you as it is about your medical partner. I cannot stress enough how important it is to have your own activities, hobbies, and commitments. You don’t want to find yourself sitting around waiting for time together, especially during their intern year when they are busy beyond belief and sleep deprived almost 100% of the time. 

That leads me to my next point: the pager. Don’t be surprised when certain ringtones on your phone are terrifying. You might actually get a mild case of PTSD after having the pager go off sporadically at all hours of the day. I had to change the ringtone on my phone because it was too similar and made my stomach drop each time I heard it. When your partner has the pager or is on-call, this is a whole new dynamic from medical school. They might be physically home because they have home-call, but mentally they might be checked out. Or, they’ll be checking the census, going over x-rays, or writing up notes from a consult. If you have any control over where you live, try to live close to the hospital because home-call is the best case scenario.

Something that just occurred to me that I can’t believe I forgot – the money! It’s not like you’re going to be rich, but it’s a pleasant change for your partner to have a steady paycheck even though, in all likelihood, it’s going predominantly to paying back student loans. Being able to grab cocktails or enjoy a nice date night is really important to staying connected and checking in with one another. 

Finally, there’s this really weird thing that happens when someone gets to residency and it’s kind of weird to talk about BUT I promised to do my best and be forthcoming, so I’m giving it a shot. Stick with me. In college, I never ran into anyone who was specifically chasing down guys in medical school to date them. I just didn’t see it happening. The guys in residency are a different story. Maybe now that they can officially be “Dr.” whoever or that they’re closer to making full salary, they become appealing all of a sudden. I’m not sure, I can’t explain it, but what I do know is that humans are human and some of them are BOLD af. I’m not saying be paranoid, I’m saying that good communication is important. Quality time together is important. Treating each other with the utmost respect, even during the worst of times, is so important. No one handles stress well and if they say they do they are lying. It affects everyone, and it can affect your relationship if you don’t take care of it. The best thing you can do for yourself is focus on your own relationship and let your partner take care of the rest. There might be a nurse or intern with a school-girl crush, I’m just saying it because it’s true and it happens, ask any doctor’s wife. But, of course that will happen because your partner is clearly desirable hence why you’re with them. I’ve seen it play out over and over – just don’t get involved. Your partner is with you, you have a great relationship, and, honestly, the last thing they want to deal with when they get home is your craziness over some inconsequential girl they are forced to work with. 

So that was a lot. Sorry. There really is so much to cover and so many small things and experiences that I want to share! Thank you so much for sending in this question and I hope this answer, though extremely long, is helpful! Send me a message here or on Instagram and let me know what you thought or if you have more questions! xx christe