He is not here

Alleluia! This morning my heart is light and my God is risen. Lent this year brought many opportunities for me to face my humanity and brokenness, and also many opportunities to draw near to the foot of the cross and cling to the feet of my Savior. And many glimpses of grace from a God after my heart. The sun breaking through the clouds, the right song at the right moment, a memory of joy surfacing at an unexpected time, a much needed call from a friend, and of course the more substantial things of finding a job, being affirmed by my supervisors, seeing my family. We are not in easy times as Christians, and especially as Catholics. The world hated Him before us, and if we imitate Him like we should, it will hate us too. Yet as much sadness and despair is in me when I look at our broken world, still death has been conquered and hell is overcome. The empty tomb means everything. I am so grateful.

Introducing...

I just accepted a job at the Children's Hospital in Denver, doing urgent and emergency care in the satellite centers. It's scary and exciting at the same time. But since being terrified has never been a reason not to do something, I'm diving in. I've been doing a Novena to St. Joseph in honor of his feast day today (I started a day late, so I'm not quite done yet!), and I've been praying for our new pope and my new job, so today seems like a great day to accept the job (and a great day to install a pope). Thank you to everyone for your (continued) prayers as I plan to embark on this next great adventure.

Things I like

Fun things from the last week--
*Lunch at Maggiano's with the whole fam. Accidentally licked my finger after getting sauce on it and endured an epic glare from Mary. Hilarious.
*Getting done with clinic way early
*The gorgeous day on Friday and getting to sit outside for a bit in the new chapel garden
*Two job offers back in the Centennial State--gonna make a decision this week--stay tuned.
*New pope! And he's awesome!
*The amazing green frosted chocolate chip cookie I just ate 'cause it's Sunday
*Checking Irish Car Bomb off my '30 Before 30' list (also accompanied by maybe the best mac'n'cheese of my LIFE
*Getting to work out 3 whole days this week (assuming I kick it into gear after this)
*Baking lazy Irish beer bread (hopefully this ends up a success and not a flop)
*Mom likes Blue Bloods as much as I do; and the library has the second season on hold for me
*Got a GREAT complement from someone I look up to a lot
*Good book: The Elegance of the Hedgehog
*My favorite attending on service

Residency 3.8: ER

I was looking forward to this month as a chance to cram in as much learning as I could, being that I'm interviewing next week for an urgent care job, and this could be my life for the next few years (and even if/when I end up in private practice, there's lots to be gained from good ER training). While the respiratory season is slowing down, it was still a decently busy month, with plenty of opportunities to practice my diagnostic and technical skills.

Two successful lumbar punctures, a deep leg lac requiring a three-layered closure with vertical mattress stitches (something I haven't seen since medical school), nail trephination (cauterizing through the nail to release blood), trauma, shock, new onset seizures, abscess drainage, ingestions, appendicitis, plenty of fractures, asthma, influenza. All the good stuff.

It makes me smile that I think of all that as the good stuff. I've decided I really enjoy the quick pace, the challenge of having a limited amount of time to see a patient and trying not to be lulled into complacency by so many similar complaints, because you never know which vomiter is going to be the pyloric stenosis and not gastroenteritis. And as I've said before, the doctors that work in the ER are some of the most fun people to be around, because they love their jobs and they have to keep things light because otherwise it gets to you.

Things like seeing a little girl in foster care come in with belt marks across her back. Or a teenager who came in after a suicide attempt and you almost pray that he's not resuscitated, because a brain-dead kid with a pulse is harder on everyone than just pronouncing him. Or the boy who was found in a car abandoned after a police chase, with no name and no family. Those days make this job hard. And for me, I think one of the hardest parts is that it doesn't get to me like it used to. But I know that a big part of that is that I've learned to protect myself from it, so that I can still do my job. It's hard to do chest compressions if you're having to think about the outcomes if you succeed in bringing a kid back. Or if you fail.

To end on a lighter note, I finished out the month by swapping arterial sticks with one of the other residents. We need to prove that we can do them in order to graduate, and neither of us have had a chance to do one on a patient, so we offered each other our wrists and stuck each other. Watching the disbelief on the nurses faces while we did it was by far the best part. Well, that, and the fact that now I can graduate.

Pray for my job interviews next week. Hopefully all this experience isn't going to go to waste.