Halfway through Quarter #1

As the result of a really great weekend full of football and anniversary festivities, my weekly post is a few days late. Better late than never! :)

Last week was a good one, nothing too notable in lecture, although we did get to cover both sexual history and nutrition/diet in our clinical skills class, which meant practicing having somewhat sensitive conversations with our standardized patients. I felt pretty good about my interviews, at least it seems that I am acquiring some rhythm in the conversation and it all happens more smoothly.

On Tuesday night last week, I attended a Pediatric Interest Group welcome dinner that was very inspiring. The room was packed full of predominantly first-years and a few second-years and we had a panel of pediatricians from Lucille-Packard Children's Hospital (Stanford's renowned children's hospital). These panelists ranged in experience level from long-standing tenure clinical professors to junior residents. They discussed why they went into pediatrics, what they see as unique about their discipline, and what kinds of challenges they have faced in their careers. The instructor of my Pediatric Physical Findings course, Dr. Charles Prober (also Associate Dean of the School of Medicine), was there - he is a pediatric infectious disease specialist - along with his wife who is a pediatric endocrinologist and as the senior physicians in the room, they certainly led the show. They are so jazzed about their jobs and explain that a lot of what is sustaining about a career in pediatrics is the resilience and optimism of their patient population. They spoke about the type of culture that is promoted in pediatrics and the residents highlighted that as one of the reasons they chose that area to specialize in. It sounds as if pediatrics makes a point of considering the whole person not only in terms of how they treat patients but also how they nurture the physicians and other health care professionals during their training and beyond.

I thought it was a wonderful event and the more and more I get connected with the world of pediatrics here, the more I feel like that field could be a very good fit for me. I am still keeping a very open mind of course, but if I do choose that path, Stanford is one of the best places to be for obtaining excellent training in pediatrics.

One large wrinkle in my week involved my catching a head cold, which really ramped up on Wednesday and by the time my Healer's Art course started Wednesday evening (the theme was Grief & Loss), my nose was running so much and I was using up so many napkins that I think everyone thought I was a tad overly connected to the topic. Despite my constant sniffling, the class was a very good one and we were able to discuss how our national culture views grief and loss and how that compares to the medical perspective pertaining to those issues. In small groups, we shared our own loss experiences, what we learned from them and the lessons we want to take from those and utilize in our careers as physicians.

On Friday, after a long day of class, Megan and her boyfriend Leo came over to my house while I cooked some African peanut stew in anticipation of Liana, Nicole, and Liana's sister arriving for some good food and good conversation. We had a wonderfully relaxed evening - we played games, watched Friends, and let ourselves unwind after a very full week.

Saturday was game day! Stanford vs. U. Washington and Stanford homecoming. Alex and I went to tailgate in the early afternoon, watched the game, which was somewhat painful as a former Husky, and then went to dinner with our friends Nick and Laurie (Washington natives - Nick is a friend from high school).

The tailgate was incredible - they had six kegs of beer (funded by an Stanford fraternity alumni group), a huge BBQ, tons of food, games, and a DJ (oh, and a big screen TV to watch the other games going on across the country). Alex and I left the game at the end of the third quarter (Stanford was already up 55 to 14). As we were walking to the restaurant in Palo Alto where we were meeting Nick and Laurie, we kept hearing the classic train sound that indicates Stanford scored - final: 65 to 21. Yowza!

Sunday marked 3 years for my relationship with Alex. We spent the morning walking to a local coffee shop we can reach from our house, midday was consisted of tutoring appointments, and then we had a picnic dinner at a Redwood City park and went to the nearby cinema to watch the new movie 50/50. It was a simple celebration, but wonderful! I can't believe it has been 3 years, but it is exciting and I feel very very lucky to have Alex down here to share in this journey with me.

That's my weekly recap. Hope you all are well!

Happy last week of October!