Veggie in the city

Hello there!

I'm VeggieFriend, I thought it would be fun to start a diary here. I've been a member of this site for a few months, but I thought it would be fun to start a diary now.

So let me introduce myself. I'm 29, wife to a new attending (he's been out of residency a little over 2 months), and mom to two cats. We just moved halfway across the country in July to our new city, which I'm enjoying very much (I had never been here before we decided to move here last fall, so this was a big adventure for me). I love the inspiration and adventure of moving, and although I'd never even been to this region of the country before, I'm really loving it here.

I recently started two new jobs (both temporary and part-time), and one of them is great, but the other one is just okay. I am pretty bored there most of the time in the one that is just okay. However, the hours are very flexible and I'm liking that, and it's at a place I'd like to work in as a permanent employee. So it's a way to get a foot in the door, even though it's turning out to be a pretty dull job.

I have many interests, including reading, art (drawing and painting), animals (I love them), and crafts. I also love hiking and outdoor activities, and love going to museums, festivals, and fun events. I am very much into self-improvement/personal development and love to read books that further this goal. I am also very much into learning, and like to take advantage of new experiences whenever I can, such as going to lectures, etc. And, of course, true to my name, I'm vegetarian!

I'm a city gal, and feel very much at home in huge cities, but I also enjoy the tranquility of the country. I love adventure, and am glad that we made this big move--big in the sense that we'd never been to this city before, I'd never been to this area of the country before, and we don't know a single person here. But I am enjoying the adventure!

Also, I am very career-oriented, and am always trying to figure out how to make the most of my skills and abilities in a career, as none of the jobs I've ever held have been a good match for me. My work history and background is "eclectic"--aka is very confusing to employers, which is why I've been severly underemployed since law school. I went to law school, decided I didn't want to practice law, and decided I wanted to be a doctor, which has always been a lifelong dream of mine. So in law school I started to take some science classes, and then I competed a post-bacc pre-med program right after law school, which took me a little over a year.

It was an exhillarating year--I loved my science courses, took orgo, physics, bio, gen chem, anatomy, etc., volunteered at free clinics, shadowed doctors, and was loving the life as a pre-med. Then I took the MCAT, and my dream began to look like it wasn't going to happen. I applied that summer to med schools anyway, and disappointingly (despite my excellent post-bacc grades), failed to get any interviews. Then I studied for the next MCAT while working full-time in the operating room at a local hospital.

So that was my first job out of law school--working in an OR! I loved working in the hospital, and I loved being in the ORs during surgeries, and learning from the attendings alongside the med students--it was thrilling!!!!! Although I was doing a lot of menial, boring work--but I loved being in the hospital environment. I felt inspired every day, and I studied hard for the MCAT and took advanced science classes at night. But sadly, my second MCAT was just one point better than my first, and I realized there was no point in applying again without re-taking the MCAT for a third time. That was April of '05. I felt crushed and let down. I couldn't understand how all my studying fell through like that, and I got pretty depressed about it, and at the same time, didn't feel that I was in the right frame of mind to re-study for the MCAT a third time, when I had just finished putting 4 months of dilligent effort into studying for the MCAT the second time around. At the same time, my job at the hospital ended, as it was only a temp job, and I began thinking about other careers, out of practicality, though my heart was, and has always been, in medicine.

I looked for a new job for 6 months. My law degree, coupled with my only job experience being an entry-level operating room job, made employers not want to hire me, though I applied for many jobs I was overqualified for. I ended up working in retail at the mall during this time, and it was a depressing time for me--working all day at the mall where everyone was 10 years younger than me, and then job searching at night and having no luck. Finally, I landed an entry-level job, but it was not a good fit, and I was bored out of my mind on a daily basis. Then I got laid off. That really sucked. Then I found a job as a legal secretary after a month of looking for something, which sucked big time. I was doing the most menial of tasks (filing, faxing, typing, answering phones), and while it paid well, it drove me bonkers. I am just not the kind of person who does well at boring office jobs, and this was the epitome of a boring office job, and I did my job well, even though I had lawyers barking orders at me all day without even a simple please or thank you. Finally, I quit that a month before we were moved here.

Moving here has been a nice change. I had an easier time finding work, and although I'm still bored out of my mind at my new job, at least it's at the place I would like to work at. However, career angst is always on my mind. I am so tired of being underemployed, which can be very stressful (when your skills and abilities go unused you just start to feel very restless, bored and frustrated) and I don't understand why I can never seem to land a job that's a good fit with my skills and abilities, instead of constantly being underemployed. I often think about returning to school, but as I already have one grad degree (and its debt!) I want to make sure I'm as close to 100% percent sure before I pursue another grad degree. I waiver from day to day on whether or not I want to reapply to med school. I think about med school a lot, and sigh with sadness when I think about all the time that has been wasted and that if only the MCAT had gone better, I'd be in med school now.

Anyhow, that's my background and where I'm coming from.

I still cannot decide which direction I want my career to take, and I've been debating this for over two years now. I am also considering dental school, a PhD in clinical psych, going back for another degree, starting a business, or entering a whole other field. And, then there's practicing law, which I am still considering (taking the bar exam this Feb.) but haven't really decided if I really want to do it.

I'm making an appointment to see a new career counselor and hopefully get all this career stuff sorted out. I've seen several career counselors in the past, but none of them were able to help me. But other than my ongoing career dissatisfaction and angst, everything else is good. I love our new city, we've done a lot of fun stuff already, even though we've only been here 2 months, and I feel inspired and motivated every day.

The only main disappointment of our move has been on the friends front. I have signed us up for so many groups/clubs/events, and we've been going, but no one seems to want another friend. We've invited couples out to dinner with us, but no one has reciprocated, and I've invited gals out to lunch, but again, no one has reciprocated. This is very frustrating for me because I had this same problem in our old city, which I also came to not knowing anyone. That problem can be summed up as: I'm always the one taking the initiatve to meet people, and asking people out for lunch, coffee, or whatever, and no one ever asks me out! It is frustrating beyond belief. I never had a problem making friends in college or law school, and am quite saddened and puzzled by how incredibly hard it is to make friends when you're out of school and in a brand new city.

Hello there! We had a great weekend this past weekend, we did a long-weekend trip to a cute town several hours away. It was very nice, we stayed at a beautiful bed and breakfast, did some outlet shopping, walked around in the beautiful fall weather, and saw some historic sites. We left Saturday morning and got back this afternoon. We had a very nice time, and it was very romantic! The bed and breakfast was just perfect! We had a lovely suite with a separate sitting area, and the country decorations were so cozy, I really loved it.

Things here are good, I still hate my job, but am trying to figure out what else I should do. I'm still struggling with deciding on what my next career step should be--either back to school or find a new job in an entirely new field. I've been working with a new career counselor, but so far I can't say she's really helping. I'm willing to give it a few more sessions, though. I still feel really lost career-wise, but I know that will take time to work on. I'm reading a book called "Work with Passion" and I did all the exercised in the book, which were very helpful, actually. It helped me really see what my top strengths and values are, and how those might translate to a career. Even with this knowledge, however, I still can't choose a career. I still can't say goodbye to medicine, which is what I really want to do, but am not sure it's the most practical thing at this point. I don't know. I feel I'm at the same place career-wise that I was two years ago, which is really unfortunate.

We've been really enjoying our new city, especially now that fall has brought some gorgeous weather! Now we're in my favorite month of the year, October. I just love October--I love the fall weather, the changing colors of the leaves, going to pumpkin patches, etc. I love everything about fall.

Still nothing new on the friends front, just disappointment as usual. We met a nice couple at another BBQ and got their email address and asked if they would like to hang out, and we never heard from them. Arggghhh! I don't understand how people can be so rude.

Well, I guess I'd better get to bed--it's back to work tomorrow.

It's super hot where we are. Our apartment gets very hot, and although the air conditioner has been running since we got home it's still incredibly hot in here. It's like August in October--scorching, even at night!

Things here are going okay. This week I've been feeling kind of down. Maybe it was coming back to work after a nice long weekend trip that was a lot of fun. I'm back at my job, and still bored out of my mind. I made an appointment with my career counselor for next Wed. and we'll discuss my career direction then. I've been thinking a lot lately about giving up dreams and whether it's ok to do this. My dream has always been medicine, ever since I was a little girl. Now I'm wondering if I should just give the dream up. Is it worth it at this point? I really don't know the answer to that and career counseling isn't bringing me any closer to the answer.

I feel like giving someone a call, but there's no one I can call! Can you imagine not having a single friend? I feel like chatting on the phone but there's no one. I already called my parents to chat. But I so badly wish I had a friend to call. The last time I had girlfriends was in law school, three years ago. Back then , I had no problem making friends. But in the past three years I haven't been able to make a single girlfriend. I don't know what it is. It seems that everyone's just too "crazy busy" to fit me into their schedule. It reminds me of how a few weeks ago we went out for dinner with another couple, and then we saw them at a BBQ a few weeks later. We asked if they'd like to go out again, and they rattled off all their committments until mid-November. It seems that no one ever has time for Veggie. My DH finds this too. Even though we're new in town (been here a little over two months), no one has showed us any kindness in terms of asking us out to lunch, etc. And then when we do the asking we never get any reciprocation. This really bothers me, and I don't know what to do about it.

On another note, I've seen a lot of really good movies lately. Here's a list of some of my favorites that I've seen lately:

Thank You for Smoking
Imagine Me and You
Poseidon
Lovely and Amazing
My Date With Drew

My Date With Drew deserves a special mention because it was so incredibly adorable and upbeat! I loved it!

I'm trying to figure out why I waste so much time when I come home from work. I feel like I never seem to get much done, and I don't know where all the time goes. I was doing one of those pie-chart things in a book where you divide up how you use your time on one of them, and then on the other you put down how you would like to use your time. So you have different slices of the pie depicting how much time you spend cleaning, eating, exercising, etc. Well, let's just say that doing that really showed me how much time after work I waste. I need to start being better about that. If anyone has any suggestions about this, please PM me.

As I wrote about in the "crazy busy phenomenon" thread, as usual, I am not crazy busy. Let's see.....my week is wide open. I work part-time, take care of the house, job search, hang out with my husband, go out and do fun stuff, and do a few hobbies on the side.....but that does not feel "busy" to me in any way, shape or form. I had to laugh when I got an email from an old college friend and every other line she described how "crazy busy" she was doing this and that. It really irked me, but maybe I'm just envious because my calendar is always bare. I never seem to have any plans, maybe because I have no friends, and DH has a lot of call which means I'm stuck by myself a lot.

I'm starting to get lonely again. For a few weeks there I was feeling okay about it, but now I really wish I had a fun female friend to pal around with. Any suggestions on how to find one? It seems that joining groups/clubs is not working, and Craig's List never seems to work either.

Residency: Then and Now

Flynn's beautiful blog entry about residency and how it changed her inspired me to write something similar here.

DH and I met while he was in med school, and I in law school. We met my first year of law school, when I already knew that the law was not for me and was beginning to look around for another career.

Since I was in law school out of state, we did the long distance thing for 2.5 years. Our relationship during med school was great. DH had loads of free time (I met him after most of his bad third year rotations were done with, such as surgery, etc.). We spent nearly every weekend together, even though we lived 5 hours (by car) apart. He drove to see me every weekend of my first year of law school, and then after that we alternated. Our weekends together were fabulous--we cooked dinner together, took long walks, went out on the town, and chatted about our future together. We had so much fun--both of us, being students, were so carefree, and since he was towards the end of med school, he had very little studying to do and we had plenty of time for marathon phone conversations every night. I felt so happy, I felt so carefree. I knew DH and I would get married.

At the same time as I was getting to know DH, while I was still in law school, I started to realize that I, too, wanted to be in medicine. I was enthralled by DH's stories of the hospital and I realized that medicine--a dream I had had since I was a little girl--was something I wanted to pursue. I started volunteering in hospitals while I was in law school, and starting taking chemistry classes with the undergrads along with my regular law classes, just to get my feet back into science and see how things went. I found that my new-found study skills served me well, and I was at the top of my class in chemistry. I loved my volunteering as well. Confident that I could succeed in science, I enrolled in a pre-med post-bacc program that would start two weeks after I finished law school. I was ecstatic. I felt like things were finally coming together.

Then intern year came around, while I was a third year in law school. Intern year was my taste of residency to come, and it was pretty bad. We only saw each other once every 6 weeks, as he had some pretty brutal internal medicine rotations with Q3 call. But I had law school to think about, as well as my science classes that I was also taking, and that kept me busy, as did making plans to move in together once law school finsihed.

I graduated from law school, and moved in with DH the next day. DH was set to start residency two months later. I moved to a city where I knew no one--where DH was doing residency--though I was confident that given its size and opportunities, I would make good friends soon. I had a group of great friends in law school, who I was sad to leave, but figured that there would be plenty of people to meet, especially as I was beginning a post-bacc pre-med program the next week.

So residency moved along, and I was well-immersed in my post-bacc. As I was a humanities major in college, and had not taken any science since soph. year of college, taking orgo, physics, bio and gen chem all at once plus labs and math was a very intense experience for me. DH tutored me in orgo while at the same time dealing with being a new resident. DH's first year of residency was brutal--and it never got easier the rest of his years in residency. He had to get up at 5 am and came home around 6-7 pm. Then he ate dinner, studied, and was in bed by 9 pm. His overnight call was awful. Q4 every month, with some months Q3. We never saw each other. Weekends were spent with him on call, sleeping, or studying. I had studying to do myself, but never seeing him wore on me.

Soon we got engaged, then we got married, all during DH's first year of residency. The summer we got married I was taking orgo and the MCAT at the same time! It was a busy year, to say the least, but I was happy as I felt I was finally on the path I was meant to take: becoming a doctor myself. However, the post-bacc was very hard on me emotionally, because even though I got top grades in it I studied my butt off and was stressed out all the time.

The rest of DH's residency was equally brutal. Despite being newlyweds, I felt we never had a honeymoon period at home, where we got to spend time together nesting. I continued to never see DH. Residency only got harder, because his next two years were filled with tests, presentations and papers he had to write. It seemed like on top of general studying, he was always either studying for an exam, or doing intense research for a presentation he had to give. One particular presentation took about 3-4 months of research to create.

Every vacation we took, with the exception of our honeymoon, was a studying vacation--he took his books everywhere. The winters were cold, long and hard. When it got dark at 5 pm and I was home alone for yet another long call night, I felt so alone. I never made any friends, despite my sincere attempts to do so, and spent many lonely nights sitting in a small, one-bedroom apartment, in the middle of a bustling city but feeling completely alone. What made things worse was that I did not get into med school, despite re-taking the MCAT a second time, and had a string of unfulfilling, entry-level jobs that left me bored and watching the clock every day. But we needed two salaries to live a comfortable lifestyle, so I went to work every day at these mind-numbingly boring jobs. And then came home to a husband who never had time for me. Tensions between us were high during his three years of residency. I was tired of always being second to medicine, and I was tired of constantly being alone. DH was always exhausted, and was frustrated with me for expecting too much from him.

During all this time, I had no idea what to expect when DH finished residency. I guess I expected things to get a little better, but I really had very little idea of how his attending job and lifestyle would go. Finally, a light at the end of the tunnel: residency was over. That was this past July. Now it was time to pack up and move to our new city, which we chose together, where DH would start his new attending job, and I would continue to work on my career issues. We were very excited.

So now it's been three months here. Three months out of residency. Things have changed, I'm happy to report. The most startling: I no longer feel like I'm always in second place to medicine. This is a whole new feeling for me.

DH's new job has better hours than residency--he no longer works 80 hours per week, and I can really feel the difference. However, he still has as much call as he did in residency, most of it weekend call, which still sucks.

DH comes home from work, not totally exhausted, and is ready to interact! We have had a lot of fun exploring our new city. He has energy now. He no longer comes home and falls asleep while waiting for dinner to finish. This is a new concept for me.

I finally feel like we're having the honeymoon nesting period I never got as newlyweds in residency. We spend our evenings talking for hours on the couch (sometimes 3 or 4 hours straight!) and have gone out to a lot of newcomers groups to try to meet people. We take walks, we've already had one beautiful vacation this month (and no studying!) which was great. We're starting a husband-wife book club. We go grocery shopping together. We go furniture shopping together.

But the sad thing is....when I think about if I'm happier now than I was in residency, I'm not sure. How can that be? Finally I have a DH who's available.....what is wrong, then? I feel terrible for saying it, but I don't think I'm any happier now than I was in residency. I'm certainly nowhere near the carefree gal that I was when I met DH at 23. I miss the person I was back then. Now, at 29, I feel weathered, I feel the weight of the world on my shoulders. I feel levels of stress I never used to feel before. I also feel like maybe the time to give up on my dreams has come, and that makes me feel sad, like I'm giving up on myself.

Why am I no happier now than I was in residency? Well, there are a lot of reasons. Here are a few of them. For one thing, now that DH is an attending, some major insecurities that I never had before have popped up. I was never an insecure person until recently. I'm trying to deal with this, but it's hard and it makes me unhappy.

Also, even though now I feel that I no longer take a backseat to medicine with DH, more than ever I feel like the backseat spouse with regard to how the world views DH. For instance, people treat me as if I'm the invisible one when learning about DH. That really bothers me. This has always happened since DH started residency, but now that he's a full-fledged dawkter now, it happens more and more frequently. He's the dawkter, and I'm just the unimportant and uninteresting dawkter's wife in the background. His family treats me this way, my family treats me this way and the world treats me this way. It bugs me.

Also, now that DH is an attending, and done with his medical path, it makes me realize how much I've been stagnating in the past few years, and that makes me unhappy. DH has made it and I'm still stuck in yet another entry-level job that I don't like. I haven't made any progress on my career goals. I'm the same as I was three years ago, whereas DH is on a whole other level. And there's still the lonliness factor. Now that he's an attending doesn't change the fact that I'm still alone a lot. And despite both of our attempts at making friends in our new city, it isn't happening. And what that means is that I'm back in the pattern of sitting home alone on his call nights, feeling all alone once again.

So basically what I'm trying to work on is a) my career issues which I cannot seem to resolve no matter what I try and b) the friends issues which I cannot also seem to resolve.

On the friends issue, DH and I have increased the number of events we go to (on Wed. we went to our 8th event in one particular group we joined--a dinner--and left yet again feeling disappointed by the experience of trying to make friends), and on Friday night we went out to dinner with a married couple we met off Craig's List. The dinner was fun but when we said goodbye they didn't mention getting together again, unfortunately. We don't know what more we can do besides continuing to meet people off Craig's List and continuing to go to these events where no one seems interested in making friends--either with us together as a couple or individually.

So basically we still don't have anyone here in our new city we could call up to chat with, or say let's go have lunch. That makes things very lonely for me. DH says that it's not as bad for him because he works so much, then comes home and wants to spend time with me. But I just work part-time, and have to sit home alone while he's on call, so this lack of friends thing is much harder on me. I guess the only thing to do is to keep doing what we're doing--more events, join more groups, keep meeting people on Craig's List.

And on the careers issue I have no idea what to do next. I've read so many career books, worked with career counselors who didn't help, etc. and now I don't know what to do. I'm sticking with my current job, even though I can't stand it, but have no idea what I should do next. Go back to school? Start a business? Find a job in yet another entirely new field? Get a lawyer job? I cannot bring myself to just choose a path and move on because I cannot bring myself to close the door on medicine. Medicine is my true calling, it's what I know I was meant to do, but at the same time I have witnessed first-hand all the sacrifices and don't know if I can do that myself. But I cannot seem to move forward, to close the door on it, or, on the other hand, go ahead and re-take the MCAT a third time and re-apply. Doing nothing and stagnating feels safer than saying goodbye to medicine, because I feel if I close the door on medicine I will be giving up on myself.

Anyhow, just wanted to share my experiences of residency, and give hope to people who are unsure, just like I was, about whether or not things do get better after residency. They do, and I am grateful for that.

Thanks.

I am going to post some positive things in this blog--here goes!

Yesterday (Wednesday) DH had the day off so I took the day off as well and we went to do some errands. First he got a haircut, then we went for lunch. It was such a beautiful day that we looked for a lunch place where we could eat outside, and it was gorgeous!

Then we looked for new glasses for DH and then went to Michael's to see if there were any fun fall decorations we could get for our apartment. But they had pretty much all the Christmas stuff up already, so we didn't see any fall decorations of the ones that remained that we liked.

It was a nice afternoon, and we topped if off by heading to the library. I love the library--I could spend hours browsing the books! I ended up checking out 10 books--they all look so good, I'm not sure which one I'll start with first! I'm currently reading a book on home buying, but when that one's done I'll start on my stack of library books.

One of the books I got was a book on cruises--comparing cruise lines and ports of call. I am a big fan of cruises--anyone else out there too? DH and I have been on 3 cruises together, and we're planning our fourth for this winter. I can't wait! I absolutely love cruises--they're such a fun yet cheap vacation! For instance, on our last cruise, the cruise part was $500 each and then we used frequent flier miles for our plane tickets, so our entire vacation--a week in the Caribbean--ended up costing around $1000 total. Now that is an amazing bargain. The only thing we ended up paying for on the cruise ship was drinks (not included--even soda is extra) and tours we took on the islands.

I am counting down the days until our next cruise! We haven't decided where we're going to go yet, but we have done the Caribbean for the past three cruises so perhaps we'll try the Mexican Riviera for this one or maybe stick with the Caribbean for a fourth time.

Travel is one of my favorite things, particularly romantic travel. DH and I took a wonderful and romantic vacation two weeks ago to Maine to see the fall foliage. This was my first time to Maine. We were there right at peak time, and while I can't say the foliage was as spectacular as I'd imagined (it was a little muted, especially in the south), we did see some gorgeous leaves further up north. We were there a week--we did a driving tour of coastal Maine, and stayed at bed and breakfasts all the way up the coast. I love b and b's!

We started out in Boston, and our first stop was Walden Pond. The colors there were gorgeous, and the water looked so tranquil. We walked around the pond and saw where Thoreau's cabin once was. It was so peaceful and tranquil there, I imagined how beautiful it must have been to watch the seasons change from that vantage point. I think I will read Walden at some point this fall--now that I've seen the place that he describes in the book. Then we made our way up to Maine, starting right at the southernmost point and making our way up the coast for the rest of the week. It was a wonderful vacation.

Maine is a very interesting state--it has a lot of character and a lot of unique things about it--all the picturesque lighthouses, the quaint harbor towns, the rolling hills and the rocky cliffs where the sea meets the land. There's just so much to do there! And the towns are just as cute as you'd imagine. My absolute favorite place that we visited was Boothbay Harbor. It was so scenic, and such a beautiful view of the harbor and water--I loved it!

This weekend was a big test for me: DH was out of town Thur. morning through today (Sun.) afternoon and I was concerned I'd get super lonely and feel sad the whole four days he was gone.

But that didn't happen at all! I had a nice weekend, actually--I stayed in the entire time except for walks and trips to the grocery store--but over the four days I did a lot of reading, watched movies, worked on personal projects, and overall had a nice time. I didn't feel lonely at all! This is a big step for me.

I did try to make some plans for the weekend, but everyone I asked was busy.

I asked the wife from the Craig's List couple we went out with awhile ago, two other gals from Craig's List I've been corresponding with, and a gal from my local alumni club if they wanted to go to an event on Saturday, but everyone was busy (however I got some nice responses). So since I didn't want to go alone, I stayed home, but I didn't feel sad by their declining my invitation because everyone seemed enthusiastic about it and bummed that they had other plans. As usual, I took the initiative and did the asking--but I got such nice responses that I felt like maybe next time they'd actually ask me.

So despite staying in my apartment for 4 days, I had a nice weekend. I called my parents a bunch of times (I'm an only child and so since I don't have any friends or siblings I just have my parents to talk to) and of course I talked to DH a few times a day. I even got a surprise email out of the blue--from a long-lost college friend! That was really nice and I was very happy about that--as I never get emails from long-lost friends!

All in all it was a nice 4 days, and I feel really good that I didn't feel alone at all! I'm making progress! I'm trying to make a concerted effort to make some changes in my life to get me out of this 2-plus year funk I've been in. One of the first changes I'm trying to make is to start enjoying being alone--to keep busy enough with things I want to do so that I don't dwell on the fact that I have no friends here. I tried very hard to do that these past 4 days when DH wasn't here and it worked really well. And I'm trying to remind myself that making friends takes time--to be more patient.

It was a nice couple of days! And I got some great reading and movie watching in. Plus the weather was beautiful and I took some nice walks around the neighborhood.

This past week I was feeling down and feeling in a rut. Despite that, two nice things happened--the first was that DH took vacation Wed. through Sun., so we had 5 whole days of "staying-at-home" vacation, which was a lot of fun and very relaxing. We had planned to meet my parents for a mini-vacation this weekend, which is why DH took the time off, but at the last minute they cancelled, so DH and I just spent his vacation at home, doing errands and hanging out. It was nice. We saw a movie, did some errands, did some major cleaning and spent all day Sunday reading.

The other nice thing that happened this week was that I think I've finally made a friend! It's a gal I've gone out with once and have been emailing for about two months, who I met through Craig's List. We last went out about 5 weeks ago, and had a nice time. This time we went on a double-date on Saturday night, and then we invited her and her husband back to our place for dessert. They were the first people we've had over since we moved here! It was a lot of fun. We had dinner downtown at an Italian place, and then came back to our place. It was fun showing them around our place and we had dessert--chocolate cake and cheesecake and ice cream. And then she wrote me a nice thank you email this morning telling me that they had fun. That made me feel good--it feels really great to have finally made a connection with someone here.

Besides those two good things, though, I didn't have a very good week. Tuesday was my last day at work--it was a project-based (temp) job, and I finished the project, so the job was over. My boss really liked my work, and said she was sad that it was time to leave, but the project was over and she didn't have anything else for me. Since then, I've felt kind of restless and directionless. Now I need to decide what my next step will be since I'm now unemployed:

a) take the bar exam and study for the next four months (test is end of Feb.)
b) find another dead-end job that I will probably not like but do it just for the paycheck
c) take some time out to job shadow and decide whether I want to go back to school or start a business

or

a) and c) together.

Still debating which of the three options above I should do. Last week not having a job to go to made me feel really restless and directionless, but at the same time, I have had 4 jobs in 3 years and all of them turn out the same way: sedentary, boring desk jobs where I look at my watch every 5 seconds.

Recently, I've been looking into the fields of speech pathology and audiology and have been researching those fields. They look pretty interesting. I'm going to try and find some people in them to job shadow.

I feel like my days are spent really unproductively and I really want to turn this around, but I'm not sure how. Maybe a time-management book? Or a personal coach? I'm trying to think about what I can do to get some direction again.

Today was depressing. Home all day with no direction, feeling restless and alone. I feel like I need to get on some kind of schedule, but when you don't have anything in particular to do, it's hard. I've been doing a lot of reading--I read for about 7 hours on Sunday, but beyond that I have absolutely nothing to do.

Tonight DH is out playing basketball, his weekly all men's league, and I feel completely lonely. I wish I had someone to call.....but I don't. I am an only child so I don't have any siblings, and we don't get along with DH's family. So that just leaves my parents to call, and I already talked to them tonight. I just feel totally and completely alone. First spending the whole day home alone, as usual, and now DH is gone at his weekly game and I just want to lay on the couch under a blanket and sob. I just really want to connect with someone.....but there's no one. This gal I mentioned in the last post who we went out with over the weekend only seems interested in meeting up occasionally--not emailing or talking on the phone, so that's out. I wish I had a real friend--the kind I had back in college and law school when we'd talk on the phone all the time. That was so nice [sigh].

I haven't made any progress on the career front other than doing some web research. I read a couple of different dental school web sites last night, and read about the classes they take. I'm going to try to find a dentist to shadow here. And I read about speech pathology and audiology master's programs, as well as PhD programs in clinical psych. It was interesting to read about what classes you take in these programs. If I don't take the bar exam I'll be able to start taking pre-reqs this winter--either upper level science for dental, since I have all the pre-med pre-reqs done, or whatever pre-reqs are needed for the other programs. At this point, I've started to lose interest in the small business idea, I'm not sure why. I met with a few small business owners 2 weeks ago and had good meetings but have started to lose interest in it.

It sucks not having more daylight out--it's always so hard to get used to it getting dark out at 5 pm.

I'm just in a pretty big rut today.

I haven't been around much lately because I've been dealing with some things in my personal life that haven't been too fun. Hopefully they get better soon.

Now that I'm no longer working, I pretty much have just been staying in. I haven't really had the desire to leave and do stuff.

I'm still debating about the bar exam. I can't decide one way or the other. If I take it, there's a high likelihood I'll fail it. I've been looking at the material and I just can't seem to retain any of it. I really don't think I could pass this test. Then why even try? It's a huge studying committment. Maybe I could use the next few months more productively.

I'm going to start job shadowing in other careers soon. I'm looking forward to finally making some progress on the career indecision front.

Other than that, DH has been working very long hours lately, so we haven't seen each other much. That's pretty much sucked. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving and it will just be the two of us. I invited my parents to come down but they are too busy right now so it will just be DH and I. I guess we'll put together some sort of Thanksgiving dinner.

On a positive note, I think I finally made my first friend here--and my first friend in 3.5 years! We've gone out every weekend lately, and she invited me to do something this weekend too. I really appreciate the fact that she's so proactive and actually invites me to do stuff constantly. It's such a nice change.

Well, gotta run. Have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

The past 6 weeks have majorly sucked for me. I have felt lonely, sad, clingy (to DH), and all-around down. Normally I wouldn't describe myself as "clingy" but I certainly have been in the past month and a half. I've cried profusely every time DH is on call, and just feel all-around lonely when he's gone. This new friend I've made doesn't like to email or talk on the phone, so I still have the problem of not having anyone to call when DH is on call.

In other news, I decided not to take the bar exam. I decided that there is very little chance I would be able to pass the exam--being out of law school for 3.5 years already plus my state doesn't have a very high pass rate to begin with. So that on top of the fact that I still have no idea of what I want to do as a career--and I know that I don't want to practice law--I decided not to take it. My parents are going to be very disappointed when I tell them--I know they've been very upset ever since I decided I was not going to practice law. I'm already considered the "scr*w-up" and "flake" of the family.....I know everyone in my family (and my in-laws too) are wondering what happened to this person? She went to a top college and law school.....why is she still trying to "find herself"--at nearly 30? I know all my family thinks I'm pathetic, and this will cement my status as such even more.

So now that leaves the big question of....what am I going to do as a career? I've been doing a lot of reading about the whole career change process in the past 6 weeks and it's really quite interesting when you break it down into its components. First, there's the career assessment part. I think I've done a pretty good job of this. I have read tons of books on the subject, and I've done all the exercises. I know pretty much exactly what I do and don't want in a career. Briefly--I don't want a desk job where I'm in front of a computer all day and I want a job where I interact with people. I don't want to be stuck doing research or writing at a desk all day, and I want a job where I am not stuck in an office all day. That's why a career in healthcare is my top choice. The other main thing I want is a career that has variety. In all my past jobs I've been doing the same thing every day. That's not my type of thing--I need a lot of variety in my work. Those are just a few of the things I've discovered through self-assessment exercises. You know, it's funny--when I think about myself as a child and what I wanted to do back then when I grew up--it's the same two career interests that I have now: medicine and entrepreneurship. I've wanted to be a doctor ever since I was about 4 years old.

After self-assessment comes career exploration. That's the stage I'm about to start. I'm about to start scheduling informational interviews and job shadowing with people in the different careers I'm considering. Then after career exploration comes the getting experience phase of the process. That's when I'd start volunteering or working to gain some experience in order to have some background when applying for a new job or applying to graduate programs.

I'll keep you updated on how the career exploration goes. I'm trying really hard to figure out a better career because the jobs I've held since law school have not been a good fit for me and I really want to find something that is. I've been doing extensive reading and a lot of self-assessment. This takes a lot of time and effort but I'm trying to put that in, because I really want a career that's meaningful and satisfying.

Well, it's Saturday night and DH is on call. That means I'm sitting home alone. Oh well, at least I had a nice day. Since DH was on call, I went out shopping, something I rarely do these days. I had a nice lunch out, walked around, shopped, and browsed at Barnes and Noble. It was nice, and I tried hard not to feel lonely seeing all these girlfriends shopping together.

Yesterday DH was post-call so we did something we hadn't done in months--went to a shopping mall. Before yesterday, I hadn't shopped in about 6 months--since we moved here. Part of it is that we're far from any malls, but we decided to go. The funny thing was that I spent $300 on clothes for me....and I felt guilty. I felt guilty for spending that much money on clothes for me because I am not working, even though I haven't bought a single thing for myself in six months. Back in our old city when I had a full-time job, I would shop a lot. But now, I feel like I'm spending DH's money and none of mine. After all, I don't have a job and I don't feel like I really contribute much to the upkeep of the household--I don't really cook and lately I haven't been cleaning, either.

Anyhow, I did get some really cute things from Express yesterday. I have been thinking a lot about the concept of "letting yourself go" after marriage, and realized a few weeks ago just how much I've let myself go....but the interesting thing is that most of this letting go has happened in the past few months, and we've been married 2.5 years. First--hair and makeup. I basically just stopped doing both a few months ago, not exactly sure why. Well, today I put on a cute outfit, did my hair and makeup, and I felt so much better! Part of the problem is that my hair takes a lot of work. It doesn't hold a style well, so unless I blow it dry and style it (about 25 minutes of work) it looks awful. So usually I don't bother with all that. But, in an attempt to do something about letting myself go, I decided I will attempt to wear makeup, do my hair and put on something cute every day.

I think the hair and makeup thing has gone hand-in-hand with my decreasing self-esteem levels. When my self-esteem was at its height (first two years that I met DH, back in law school when I was 23-24), I wore makeup, did my hair and dressed cute all the time. Contrast that with now (29) when for the past 7-8 months I've let all that go. I've been thinking lately that I really want to become more like the way I was when I was 23-24. Quite honestly, I liked myself better back then and was way more carefree. These days I feel stressed and sad much of the time. Let's compare....then and now.

Then: Back when I was 23-25, I lived alone out in the boonies and felt totally fine about it. Since DH and I did the long-distance thing for 2.5 years while I was in law school, I spent many weekends alone but never felt lonely. I think that's because DH and I talked on the phone every night for at least 3 hours.
Now: From 26-29 I have lived in the heart of cities and felt completely alone. DH and I certainly don't talk for 3 hours a day anymore. In residency, I was lucky to get 15 minutes of quality time with DH a day.

Then: I had lots of friends in law school.
Now: A 3.5 year dry spell has meant many sad, lonely days and nights when DH is working. I haven't heard from the one friend I thought I made here in two weeks--so who knows what's happening with that.

Then: I loved going out drinking and dancing.
Now: Except for one drink I had last week, I haven't had an alcoholic beverage in about 2.5 years. I haven't gone out dancing in about 2 years.

Then: I used to cook and bake all the time. Granted, the kinds of things I would cook were far from gourmet, but I enjoyed cooking and thought it was fun.
Now: I rarely cook and pretty much we eat frozen entrees 6 days of the week.

Then: Although I was in law school and knew I didn't want to practice law, I felt super-excited about my post-bacc that I knew I'd start right after law school graduation (which I did).
Now: One failed attempt at applying to med schools and two awful MCATs later, I am not sure if my med school dream will work out. I have worked 4 crappy jobs in the past 2.5 years. I feel the increasing pressure to decide on a career now even though I still feel completely clueless as to what I want to do for a career beyond medicine.

Then: Because DH was in med school when I first met him (I met him in his 3rd year), he had tons of free time (for some reason) and when we spent weekends or vacations together it was 100% pure fun.
Now: DH works 80 hours a week, and in his time off has a lot of studying to do. That limits our fun time.

Well, as you can see, I really feel like I had a better quality of life back when I was 23-24. Now, the question is: what can I do about this? How can I get this quality of life back now, when I'm 29? I'm not exactly sure how to do that, but to start I need to work on my self-esteem. The makeup, hair, and dressing nice makes me feel better, so that's a start, and tonight I made cupcakes--something I used to do (baking) all the time but stopped in the past few years.

Somewhere between ages 23-24 and 29 I lost my groove. I need to get it back, but I'm not sure how. How do you find your groove again? I think I need to first find a career, then make some friends, then try and get back the joie de vivre that I used to have but that has since gone away, for whatever reason. I don't know why it left in the first place. I think it was the crushing disappointment of not getting into med school that really did it for me, and then the four crappy jobs that followed where I felt completely unchallenged, unappreciated and bored out of my mind.

The other day I watched the movie "Accepted." It just came out on DVD. I really identified with the movie. It's about a college senior who applies to a bunch of colleges and doesn't get into any of them. So then he and his friends decide to invent a college--they lease an abandoned building and work to fix it up. They call it South Harmon Institute of Technology. I thought the premise of the movie was great--and I could really identify it. I feel similarly to the main character who applied to all these colleges but got rejected from every one. I feel rejected both professionally and personally (in terms of friends). Not just not getting into med school--but also applying to all these great jobs over the years and getting rejected from those because employers kept telling me I was "overqualified" and that I would get bored and leave. Sadly, as a result I ended up in some extremely low-level jobs as a result, which made me feel completely unchallenged and has resulted in the slow erosion of my self-esteem. My resume is a joke.

I also have felt rejected in the friends department--I have tried so hard to make new friends, both in this city and our last one. I signed DH and I up last week for a couples' potluck dinner club, where you meet once a month with other couples for a potluck dinner....we'll see how that goes. We've been going to all kinds of events like this and we never seem to make any friends out of it......I am just tired of being rejected, and I could really empathize with the main character in the movie.

On that note, I am going to heat up my frozen entree.

So lately I've been trying really hard to do more cooking at home. I think we've achieved some modest success in this area. Last night I was inspired to make baked ziti. It turned out delicious and it was so easy to make. We had a nice salad with it. Today we had leftovers of that, and I made an additional side dish of scalloped potatoes. It was great! And Sunday DH made his delicious grilled cheese sandwiches. He makes them incredibly well. We had tomato soup with that. Overall, in the past month or so we've been cooking at least 60% of the time.

I got an email today from one of the many groups I'm signed up with here, and the email said that they weren't planning any events for the month of December because they knew that everyone was "crazy busy." I laughed when I read that. I took a look at my calendar, which is right next to the computer. The only thing marked on my calendar for the entire month is that on the 19th I have to renew my library books. Some people truly are not crazy busy--or even remotely busy. We have no holiday plans; we have no New Year's Plans.

In other news, I've been trying to do more romantic things for DH--as I wrote in my thread in the marriage section, I really would like to improve the romance in our relationship.

More cooking updates--

Last night DH made sweet potato apple bake and barbeque turkey meatballs all by himself! He even went to the grocery store, got all the stuff, cooked everything--and cleaned up (and he cleaned the entire kitchen as well!) It was amazing--the food was excellent and he got major hugs and kisses for cleaning the entire kitchen! He even braved the fridge and tossed some mystery items that were covered in mold!

I made cupcakes the other day--yellow cake with chocolate frosting--and they were so good!!!! The recipe made 40 of them and I polished off 15 yesterday! Yum! The funny thing is that I hadn't made cupcakes in so long that I totally forgot to use a muffin pan--I just poured the batter in the little paper cups and put them all on a cookie sheet and baked them--then I wondered why all the cupcakes turned out misshapen and square. But then I didn't even realize until I sent my mother a picture of the cupcakes and she said you forgot to use a muffin tin--your cupcakes are all square. I hadn't even realized that was why until she said it.

I have been going to bed soooo late lately--I went to bed at 4 am last night and got up at 1:30 today! I need to get back on a better schedule.

I have been on the worst sleep schedule this week! I can't seem to get tired before 3:30 am and then I sleep until 1:30 pm. I need to get off this crazy sleep cycle! Last night I was in bed reading at 11 pm but I did not fall asleep until 3:30! I was reading a good book, though....it's called "The Know-It All" by AJ Jacobs. I think it was on the NYT Bestseller list a year or two ago--it's about a guy who's an editor at Esquire I think who decides to read the entire Encyclopedia Brittanica as a personal project (non-fiction). It's really good and very funny--sort of in the same genre as "Julie and Julia"--I loved that book too, same concept.

The other book I was reading last night is a romance novel--I do not usually read fiction but I thought I'd get this one from the library--just to try one. It's a fast read, but kinda dull. I can count on one (maybe two) hands the number of fiction books I've read since college--I prefer non-fiction.

We're still doing well with the cooking.....I am starting to really enjoy it.

DH has had an awful call schedule lately. He was on call last Thurs., last Sat., Wed. and now tonight. So I've been home alone a lot. But I decided last Thurs. that I would no longer complain about his calls. Normally, I do complain quite a bit--but I've decided to stop doing that. So since his Thurs. call I have not complained one iota about his calls. I have also not cried on the phone (as I used to do) or feel super lonely during them, either. I used to get so lonely during his calls that I'd cry, often when I was on the phone with him. But at the same time as I decided to stop complaining about his calls I also decided to try and quell the feelings of lonliness too. So I just try really hard not to think about it. I try to keep myself super busy at home. So far, I must say, it's working pretty well. I'm trying to embrace the aloneness--to do productive things during it rather than dwell on it.

One of my biggest pet peeves is people who do not return emails. Man, this bugs me! It happens to me all the time. For instance, I wrote an old college friend to say hello and see what was up. No response. Why are people so inconsiderate? I just don't get it!!!!

The other night I watched one of my favorite movies, "Lovely and Amazing." This movie is so good. It's an independent movie. The plot is hard to explain, but it's mainly more of a sociological commentary about women and insecurity--all of the main characters share that in common. It's kind of like the movie "Friends with Money"--which I also really liked.

Hello!

I haven't been around much this week--have been busy with some personal projects and doing stuff with DH. DH had no call this week--which was amazing. We have had a great time every day after work, and it's been so nice! We had a nice weekend, too. Friday night we just hung out and watched movies. Saturday we slept in really late and then went to a holiday party that was put on by a young professionals group we joined. The party was fun--it was mostly singles there but there were a few couples. We've been to a number of events with this group and still haven't made any friends from it (we invited one of the couples in the group out for dinner back in August but they never reciprocated). Then we stayed up late Saturday night watching two movies--Forrest Gump and Superman.

Today we went shopping and out for lunch and it was a lot of fun. We spent a few hours at Barnes and Noble browsing and it was very nice.

We don't have any holiday plans but since DH has the whole weekend off I'm sure we'll have fun just the two of us.

I've definitely been making a lot of progress on the feeling lonely front. I haven't felt lonely in weeks--and it's not because I have any friends to hang out with (the one friend I made here I haven't seen since before Thanksgiving). I think it's more a change in attitude. I just decided about a month ago not to let the lack of friends bother me and it really hasn't. I've kept myself busy with personal projects and that's been very helpful. And even DH has noticed a big difference. Yesterday he said, "You haven't said you've felt sad or seemed lonely in a long time. You haven't even mentioned my calls either." Basically, since I realized that it's going to take a long time to make friends--if it even happens here at all--I realized I need to start embracing the time alone and keeping busy is a big part of that. I just think to myself about how I need to take advantage of all this free time now before I get into another full-time job or go back to school. So I've been reading tons, working on some personal projects, etc. I'm signing up for an art class that starts in January. I think I was feeling in a rut for awhile there this fall but I think I'm out of that now.

Now I'm starting to apply to jobs--I'm thinking part-time right now so I can continue to do career exploration in order to find a new career. I've been doing a ton of research on careers but still find that I'm stuck in the self-assessment phase--this is the part I've always had trouble with--I can't seem to figure out which of my career values is most important. There are many things I want in my new career but I realize that no career will fulfill all of them--but I can't decide which are the most important to me. Maybe the job shadowing will help me figure that out.

In other news, two of my cousins just got engaged, so DH and I have two weddings to go to this summer. I was looking at dresses today when we were out shopping and saw a few really nice ones.