Potential EM spouse needing insight...

Hey there I am wondering if any of you EM spouses can help me understand how anything can be on a normal schedule or routine with messed up shifts during M4 Jr. internship? It's crazy now and its the last year of med school so what is it like in residency or actual practice? We don't have children yet but we plan to, how is this lifestyle when raising kids? I am so confused since you may have seen my other post saying my hubbie cant make up his mind. I am trying to give my input but not knowing the reality of the specialty is causes a lose of opinion in the decision.

Thanks,

Benny's mom

Spouse to a M4 that has no idea what he wants to do... FRUSTRATING is an understatement!!!!

[Deebs]

We don't have any kind of schedule that includes DH, really, but I think that also applies to many other specialties, such as surgical specialties. We have two kids and a third on the way. I plan my days and when DH is off or available, he accompanies us to whatever was previously planned. We have come to terms with the fact that we don't have holidays or weekends. There are two types of days here - on shift and off shift.

We are looking forward to moving because the culture here in EM has been very disconnected from family life. When we were in MN, it was very common for families to try to join mom or dad for dinner or lunch (and just leave if the ED was very busy). That isn't the way it is here, but supposedly it is where we are going. For the most part, we do okay. I know that because we're moving at the end of the month, DH has a stretch of 8 days working straight in order to get his shifts in for the month. That will be killer for the kids and I, and DH will definitely pay for it when it's done because the kids will be mad at him.

I have had a hard time here because medical families don't seem to really hang out together, but I have found friends whose spouses are in high level executive positions, and we seem to have very similar lifestyles, so it's a little easier to hang out with them.

We're still working on the sleep issues with working nights, but our kids are really young, and we're only a couple of years out of training, so I'm hopeful that it'll get easier over time.

Like with any specialty there are + and -. We are still in residency so it is hard. I completely plan my life around his shifts. I stay home with DS so at least I am available when he is off. We usually don't even know what day of the week it is, like Deb said the days are "on" or "off".
I have high hopes for our post residency life though. DH's hours will be approximately half what they are right now. And you know that the off shift days are really off, you don't have to be on call. And most jobs seem to be 8 or 10 hour shifts, right now he does 12's which are brutal.

Well, I don't have the luxury of planning around him. I'm in school, my kids are in school, so he has to plan around us. It's not so bad, but honestly after being at this, and working a ton to make it work so hard, since undergrad, I'm kinda use to the disfunction. I basically just glance at the schedule here and there. I try to get him to move shifts around if he has a whole ton of evening shifts 5-3 type of shifts, because the kids hardly see him before work, or at all, and don't see him before school starts either. Otherwise his am and overnight shifts (11-7) are doable. We just make a bigger deal for lunch if he is gone for dinner, etc. Honestly every profession has it's down side. I can only think that Derm and Optho have true *easy* hours (of course this is subject to the practice they are in as well). The biggest blessing about EM is the absence of the horrid pager. When they are off, they are really off. The calls they get from co-workers about patients are MUCH less than other specialities. So while a ped may have office hours, he could still be on call every other week, depending the size of the practice. Unfortunately nothing is medicine comes with a fabulous schedule. Fit your life in, then let them fit around you, or it'll start to get to you that the burden of family cohesion is your job. IMO, it's not. Sure you try to accommodate them, but it's better they are mindful of how their job effects everyone else, not vice versa. But that's just my take, everyone is different on how they look at this.

Hour wise, we expect him to work 45-55 hours when done. But I'm not holding my breathe. I'll believe it when I see it.

HTH,

After 8 years of being out, DH finally no longer works nights. He works 8 12 hour shifts and the rest are spent working days on the residency program. We as a family knew nothing else but the crazy shift work for so long it was just second nature. The girls never knew anything but what we had so it made it very doable.

Thanks for the support

I really enjoyed reading the responses and I must say I feel better about everything. But I am so concerned about the back and forth between day and nights and working weekends, holidays, and the what ifs of residency. Maybe I shouldn't consider the residency as much as I am because it is only 3 or 4 years. Once we are through with that, please tell me the type of practices they tend to work with and how the practice schedules, compensation, etc are done. I know this varies from place to place but any insight would be great for me to see if I can handle the lifestyle and demands of the EM attending doc.

I really enjoyed reading the responses and I must say I feel better about everything. But I am so concerned about the back and forth between day and nights and working weekends, holidays, and the what ifs of residency. Maybe I shouldn't consider the residency as much as I am because it is only 3 or 4 years. Once we are through with that, please tell me the type of practices they tend to work with and how the practice schedules, compensation, etc are done. I know this varies from place to place but any insight would be great for me to see if I can handle the lifestyle and demands of the EM attending doc.

Well the first thing for what life is like, is to see if he wants to do academics or private. You have two very different lifestyles right there (or this is how I understand it). Some academics have you do very little shifts, as little as 8 shifts, but then tag on work for the residency program and research. If you are a program director or ass program director your work is even more administrative. Some people in academics hardly work in the ED at all, some work almost the same as non-academic. So just in that area, a lot of variability. The PD we know, his wife told me with their new program, he is hardly home. And when he is home he is always working. But that is the hardest situation I could imagine for academic, helping a new program find it's routine.

Then private. Private varies a ton too. Rural places, expect to get paid a lot and work A LOT, ain't nothin for free. Some private has it really easy with 12 shifts a month, but don't expect to pick which hours he gets until he has some seniority. Some new places want you to work straight nights for 2 or 3 years, so you can pay your dues, and then you are asked to join their practice. Some private practices are contracted as a whole group to a hospital, so again, more variability there.

Honestly, you can't pin point how your life will exactly be for any of the specialties. The best I can say is, the hours are shift work, there is no pager. For almost everything else, you don't do shift work, you have a pager, you may or may not have more control over what holidays are off, etc. Really, for your end of the spectrum, that's the real difference. Other specialties often have to work weekends just like EM, either on call, or scheduled to do so at the hospital, or being called in to check on a patient. The rest is all what he experiences. And a unhappy husband makes for an unhappy family. See what he is more inclined to. The real thing to think about IS actually how the RESIDENCY affects you. For EM it's 3-4 minimum and you are done. For surgery, it's 5-11 years (yes I know someone who's spouse did 11 yrs of just training). How your life is afterwards, is much easier for you both to have control over, than it is for training.

HTH.