5 months ago I finished my residency training in Family Medicine at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. During my three years of residency training I posted to this blog three times- mea culpa! There definitely wasn’t a lack of things to write about in residency- and I regret not jotting down notes of stories to recount or emotions to unpack- but sadly my urge to write during residency faltered and was replaced with an urge to… survive.
Residency is hard. It’s wonderful, amazing, at times exhilarating and at times demoralizing, and it is definitely hard. There’s a reason people have written books (fact and fiction) about residency, and sadly there are also reasons why there is a deluge of mental health problems in residents [1-2]… I hope I’ll get back to writing about some of my experiences soon, but only time will tell!
In the 5 months since finishing residency I’ve done a lot! Historically, residency ends June 30th (or more precisely STARTS July 1st, so you finish X years later), and a few days into July I was winging off to Japan with my boyfriend to explore Japan. The motivation to visit Japan was the promise of a bike tour around Hokkaido, the northernmost island in Japan. For over a decade my brother has taken time every summer to tour Hokkaido by bike, and thanks to various academic obligations I’ve never been able to join him – until this year.
I’ll try and flesh out this adventure at some point in the future, but to cut a long story short, we biked and ate our way around 900km of Hokkaido in 10 days. It was exhausting (and as expected somewhat uncomfortable at times), but it was a wonderful adventure. We visited a historic soba house, took a tram up a mountain, visited a lavender farm, tasted expensive (and delicious) melons, feasted on delicious food, and ate more ice-cream than is probably reasonable…
My trusty steed for our 900K adventure.
Part way through a 76K day along the northern coast of Hokkaido.
Quite a bit of our cycling was on nice bike paths.
Stunning flower farm in Bie.
One of our many traditional dinners.
One of many not-traditional icecreams. Lavender flavored at the Lavender farm, of course!
In August I invited myself up to Canada to spend time with my friend and fellow ancestrally-minded MD, Don Wilson. He graciously put me up in Calgary, Vancouver Island, and his home reservation of Bella Bella. Not only did I get to tour Calgary, visit Banff, and see Vancouver Island, but I got to drive up to Port Hardy and take the ferry up to Bella Bella where I got to experience a bit of rez-life and the wonderful hospitality (and traditional foods) of the Heiltsuk people. The experience, and the wildlife, were incredibly memorable.
Don and I enjoyed a great hike up Sulphur Mountain in Banff.
They were all over in Bella Bella.
I had the privilege of being invited out salmon fishing with a couple of the locals and helped the pull in hundreds of pounds of Silver, Chum, and Coho Salmon that was eaten, frozen, and smoked. Yum!
“Old Sam” or “The Watcher”. Whatever you call him, he is striking. The men who took my out fishing also brought me to this island for a visit.
Great Blue Heron
A reason not to hike alone… This bear was out with her two cubs.
In September I took some time to travel back to New Jersey where I caught up with friends and family. I have loved my 3+ years in Utah, and think there’s a good chance I’ll be back in the Bee Hive State in the future, but New Jersey will always hold a place in my heart and may one day call me home.
Cow and calf at my parents farm.
In between all these trips I would head back to Utah, a state which I love to call home. I have never regretted my choice of residency programs: I had wonderful mentors and a great education in a place that allowed me to savor every free moment I had. It’s the place where I learned to love mountain biking, the place where I rediscovered alpine skiing after a 13-year hiatus, the place where I learned that rock-climbing doesn’t play to my strengths but is worth a go anyway. The people are friendly, the academics are excellent, and the wilderness is world class.
Cartwheels over Canyones… Capitol Reef is one of the “Big 5” National Parks in Utah. Definitely worth saving.
Canyoneering in Arches National Park (Spot the person on rappel!). Another great adventure in another great Utah Park.
Mountain biking in the Wasatch- one of the new hobbies I took up while a resident is slowly peddling uphill and then speeding down through single track faster than is probably advisable…
It may just be marketing, but sometimes it certainly seems like Utah has “The Best Snow on Earth”.
So where am I now?
After a brief stint moonlighting in some Urgent Care clinics in Salt Lake City, I’ve moved onto the next chapter in my life as a GP (General Practitioner) in the South Island of New Zealand, not far from Christchurch. I’ve been interested in practicing medicine in New Zealand since early in residency, having had a great trip here before starting residency and then hearing from a couple of physicians who enjoyed their time as GPs in the New Zealand system. I’ve signed on for a year and will see where the future takes me!
Mt Cook from the Hooker Valley Track.
I arrived in New Zealand mid-October and shortly thereafter spoke about Ancestral Health in Academic Medicine at the Ancestral Health Symposium New Zealand in Queenstown. I started practicing at the beginning of November and am just rounding out my first month of practice in New Zealand. It’s exhilarating, interesting, and at times a little intimidating (as I imagine all new-graduates find their post-residency jobs).
A bit of lunch-time exploration at AHSNZ
So that’s a quick update from me- I hope to get back into a swing of writing about life, medicine, and ancestral health. Watch this space!
- Mata DA, Ramos MA, Bansal N, Khan R, Guille C, Di Angelantonio E, et al. Prevalence of Depression and Depressive Symptoms Among Resident Physicians: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. JAMA. 2015 Dec 8;314(22):2373.
- Yaghmour NA, Brigham TP, Richter T, Miller RS, Philibert I, Baldwin DC, et al. Causes of Death of Residents in ACGME-Accredited Programs 2000 Through 2014: Implications for the Learning Environment. Acad Med. 2017 Jul;92(7):976–83.