When you finished training....

[planet]

Two recent interactions have me wondering if I am living under some insane illusion that life will get better. I have talked with two different spouses of attendings and it sounds like life didn’t really improve/change as much as I keep thinking it will.

Could those of you whose SOs are out of training pitch in with your opinions/perspectives? How much more time do you seem to have with your SO? If you have student debt, how much is the debt offset by a better salary? Does it seem like your SO remains the one to work all else around? Anything else that struck you that you might want to pass on?

Thanks,
Janet

[Sheherezade]

My favorite topic!

Whine, whine, whine

The money situation has improved tremendously. We consolidated the student debt, so I can't speak to that - but the payment is completely painless. We have also started power saving for retirement and college. We have a nice house, but we could have qualified for 2x as much mortgage. We tried to go small so we'd have more financial flexibility. (It's worked.) We pay off all our credit cards each month with no problem. We had to host that huge party and fund it at Christmas and although I whined incessantly we did it without financial distress. So....money's good.

Time is also much better - he has one day off a week. He actualy gets it off about 60% of the time, but that's still fantastic. Call is shared among the partners - about every third or fourth. He hardly ever has to go in -- just answer pages. He is still unpredictable due to the surgery component. I have learned to write off his surgery day. Surprisingly, his office patient days suck even more in terms of hours because he has about 2-3 hours of paperwork to do after he's done seeing patients and then he has to round before going home. So...he has 2-3 bad days 1 day off and one normal day. Weekends call every 3rd -half days or so. Much better than fellowship!!!!!!

The elements that don't improve are availablity and predictablity. He is not available much of the time. He could not back me up if I needed him. Sometimes, he is virtually unreachable. He also may be called in at anytime -really- if he's not out-of-town. Even on his day off or when he isn't on-call to back up the general gyn surgeons. When this happens, it's a drop everything situation and head straight in. This has happened several times a year. A final element has been the surprising mount of travel required by his job. He's away at meetings maybe 6-7 times a year. These are required.

I would say we still revolve our schedule around his job. So sad. So true. Maybe it's habit? I'm glad I'm not working or I'd probably be in counseling. It isn't a regular job - ever - but it does get better!

[rainbabies]

[mommax3]

The money situation is MUCH better than it was in training, (duh!) but between trying to aggressively pay down our credit card debt, pay off student loans, take advantage of DH's company matching the first 5% he contributes to his 401K and private school tuition.....it is not nirvana! We still have two cars with high miles (and one isn't even paid off!) and basically no nice furniture. (Although we do have a very nice playset in the backyard...... ) We also took out much less of a mortgage than we could have, and I am thankful we did that!

I do think, though, that in five years (maybe sooner) things will be MUCH better for us financially. We are just really trying to bite the bullet right now.

Schedule-wise..... . It is obviously MUCH MUCH better than residency. It is not as nice as DH's military schedule, but that is mainly because in the military there were three docs to share call with, and now there are only two (although they hope to hire another once they are busy enough). We still plan around the call schedule in a major way, and he is on call half the month, so that's a lot of impact. He isn't in surgery as often as goofy's husband, since DH is a generalist (just two afternoons a week, which they hope to move to mornings once their volume is up) but he is incommunicado and out of the loop during that time, and he won't go more than 15 minutes away from the hospital when he is on call, so for instance, if one of my sons has an away basketball game after school on a call day, I am there solo with the other two, which really gets old after a while.....but that is just the way it is.

Still, there is a lot to be said for being autonomous! (Especially after having been in the military.....) DH and his partner have very similar priorities and standards, and since they knew each other before, (during residency) they already have a comfort zone with one another, so there has been no "getting to know you" tip-toeing around. They can structure their practice to their comfort zone, as long as they are meeting their financial obligations. This makes a huge difference in terms of DH's day-to-day happiness. This first year (we are seven months into it) has been a little more stressful than either of us anticipated, with a big learning curve for DH as far as learning how to market and function in the civilian world, but now that his practice is getting busier, he is finding his legs and starting to really enjoy himself.

My advice to anyone would be to beware of the rose colored glasses (it is much nicer to be pleasantly surprised than to have a rude awakening!) and to be prepared for the first year to be somewhat stressful. Of course, my experience is a little different because we had four years of military payback between the end of residency and now, so it may not be as helpful as what others will have to say.

Sally

[Sheherezade]

I have to add that last year - our first year out- was a *lot* more stressful on all counts than this year (year two). So , it get better ...and then better. I hope this trend continues.

[Phoebe]

We're on our third year out. Wow, time has flown. I have to echo what Angie and Sally mentioned about the financial situation. It is better than fellowship for us, but at times it feels like we are right back there with the hours and call. DH has a clincial position so attending meetings is not mandatory. I can usually reach him, but he doesn't have flexibility unless it is an extreme situation or planned in advance.

I feel like the last six months have been much better for our family because I think DH has settled into his job and our stress levels are down a lot. Plus, my husband doesn't have to study for a board exam for another year. Life is stressful in other ways because we have more children and don't live very close to family. I also agree with Angie that the first year was the hardest and it has gotten easier as time goes on.

Jennifer

From the perspective of babysitting for a family with an orthopedic surgeon parent, a few years out does seem to be a turning point. I started watching their kids when they were about 3-5 years out (not sure exactly). For what it is worth, this was over 15 years ago. I spent a fair amount of time with their kids as they were growing up.

If I had to guess, the financial situation they have now is probably not what they imagined just after finishing -- better than they expected, IMO.

Family time wise, most of the babysitting jobs I had were for both of them going out in the evenings. A few times I watched their kids for extended weekends. So, they had time for that. I don't remember much else of his schedule. They did more as a family too on the weekends he wasn't on call (obviously). I was pleasantly surprised by how connected he was with his kids when I saw them together a few years ago. I think it was a priority and something he made a point of as his kids got older. I'm guessing, but I think she would say that attending life was better than residency, esp since that was about 20 years ago.
For what that is worth...

[Amiens]

SO we are 6 months out, wow it's wierd to think that a year ago we just signed our contract. Anyway-- we have stuck with the advice given by others in the medical field "The first year or two out continue to live like you are in residency, with a little pay bump." Dh's uncle is in anesthesia, and when he first got out of training, he didn't heed this, and lived on all of his money. He says he wishes they had been more frugal the first couple of years out, only because you don't know what things are going to pop up.

The money is MUCH better than residency. I am not as stressed about groceries, we did allow ourselves to sign up for cable (something we have never had in 7 years of marriage), and we bought a nicer minivan than we would have if still in training, we went to having 2 cars instead of 1. Also, for the first time in our married life we are actually able to put away 10% of dh's paycheck for retirement, contribute to a 401K, and save for our three children. That said, we don't have nice furniture yet, we aren't eating out all of the time, or buying designer duds..... we could but we would be living paycheck to paycheck, and I didn't want that when we finished. I also didn't want to have the mentality of "oh we'll be getting a payraise in such and such time, so let's take out a loan or put it on credit." I grew up with parents who went into debt and ended up declaring bankruptcy. I will probably always be cautious of our finances because of my childhood.

The hours-- MUCH MUCH better than residency. I actually don't mind when dh calls up and says "can I work until 3 or 4 pm instead of 2 pm?" My daughter has stopped saying that dh lives at the hospital. However, because anesthesia has a wierd call system, we will forever plan our lives around the call schedule. No biggie. It's just how life is.

Crystal

[Flynn]

I agree with the previous sentiment...

We're ALMOST done (I still whisper this in case the medicine gods choose to add two more years to our training ) and from what I can tell so far, it really depends on the job you choose after training.

There are hellish jobs and jobs that are "reasonable." With that being said, unpredictibility will always be an issue for us.

Having low expectations the first year or couple of years as far as lifestyle will help. If my DH is around 25% more than he is now it will seem like a vacation to us -- he's GONE SO MUCH... (waaaa, ok, I'll stop! ).


So it WILL be better but it will never be fantastic. We all are so used to the bottom of the barrel as far as lifestyle thought, it must SEEM a LOT better when we're done right? It's all based on what you're used to.

[planet]

Thanks so much for posting your experiences/perspectives. I hadn't thought about the stress factor. It seems like it should get less stressful, not more. We fully plan on living like students long after residency ends.

[SueC]

Somehow I entirely missed this thread.
We are 6 months out and it is better. Regarding time with dh, he seems to feel like he has a little more autonomy of his schedule and feels a little more free to go in late now and then for whatever reason. I think he may come home slightly earlier and is on call fewer nights, but when he is on call or is in the ICU, his hours suck. But, honestly, I feel like I've gotten really good at dealing during those times that it really doesn't phase me. A few weeks ago he was on call and I was home with sick kids, but I don't remember feeling overwhelmed by his inability to pitch in. He's not around all the time, and frequently not home in time for dinner, but it really doesn't bother me anymore.
Regarding money/lifestyle. There is more money now, and the lion's share is going towards debt, but I sleep better at night knowing we are finally dealing with it. We didn't move into a big fancy house, but we did upgrade our cars and feel like we have more to spend on wants vs. needs. I still watch our budget pretty closely (or I should be, something I'm working on) but in a few years, we'll be in a much better situation financially. There was an initial letdown that it wasn't quite as fantastic as I thought it would be, but I got over that and am really content with the way things are going.

[Vishenka69]

However, because anesthesia has a wierd call system, we will forever plan our lives around the call schedule. No biggie. It's just how life is.

Seriously???? This is the part that bugs me the most about residency. Am I destined to attend events solo for the rest of my life?