I'm glad June is over - I can't beleive that DH is officially a 6th year. 6th year? REALLY? How can that be? How is it that we moved here 5 years ago with nothing but minimal possessions, we both started new jobs, bought a new house, we were making over $80K between the two of us, driving two new cars and had nothing to worry about but ourselves? DH started as a very green intern, sloshed through PGY-2 and then loved PGY 3 & 4 before moving onto research as a PGY 5&6. In that time we adopted a baby beagle who became our first child, went through months and months of fertility treatments and finally welcomed our baby girl. I got laid off, our income got cut in half, we've made multiple improvements to our home and then were shocked when another pregnancy appeared out of nowhere earlier this year. Fellowship has been lined up though we're still waiting on the papers to sign but we're looking forward to moving to Portland in 2 years.

How did all of that happen? How is it that 5 years goes by so fast when 7 seems like it will take forever at the beginning? I'll never forget when DH got his residency paperwork and it said through June 2011 - we both just looked at each other, what the heck were we getting into? Now I think 2 years is going to take forever before we can head off on our next journey. I think about the fact that the new baby boy will be Adele's age now when we move.

However I also think about what DH's job prospects are going to look like in 3 years. I think the best thing this country could have done was elect Obama, as much as I liked McCain we needed a change. However the more and more I hear about the changes that need to made to the health care system the more I worry about DH's life's work. He loves working in his lab, feels like he's making real progress on brain cancer answers, however his PI has applied for tons of grants and because the grant system is broken they wait and wait for answers. Until they get another grant the PI can't hire another tech which DH really needs because he's doing so much of the day to day experiments himself he can't analyze the data and figure out what to do next or what to do different. He could easily work 24 hour days and still not get it done, he's frustrated, feels his lab time slipping away and doesn't know if at the end of his 2 years it will have been worth it. He also loves operating, loves it and really wants to be at a program where he can work with a PhD to continue his research while still operating more then 1/2 time and teaching residents. The Mayo system has been touted lately as a great system, as a great financial option for Obama's plan, however as insiders we see the issues that it has as well. I don't think its the be all, end all, I think there has to be a happy medium.

I worry where DH's job will be in 3 years, not geographically, we've already proved we can be flexible and we actually like having some space between us and our families. However I worry what the job will be like, what the pay will be and whether or not he'll be happy. He's become so frustrated with the buraucracy in the lab that I'm afraid he'll become disenfranchised with the system if his first job isn't all he expects it to be. I know he has high expectations, he has learned and been trained at the best locations, that is what he expects. I'm afraid he won't get it.

This has turned into a longer babble then I expected. This kind of stuff has really been bugging me that last few weeks as we hear more and more about the health plan changes. We'll see what happens it could be an interesting ride.