Match Day. A single day that impacts the futures of the 4,800 Canadian Medical students and the 1,800 IMGs that apply to Canadian residency programs every year. Plus, the tens of thousands of their family members. As the spouse of a doctor, my Match Day is a day I’ll never forget.

Physician families face unique challenges including frequent moves, abnormal work hours and fluctuating finances. Surveys conducted for the general population in the USA and Canada report that between 72%1 and 80% of North Americans feel stress about at least one aspect of their finances.

We all know that medical marriages are complicated ones. As well, I can attest that military ones are highly complicated as well. In fact, from what I hear from my civilian counterparts, their lives are at times very similar to mine.

I remember it well. Over 8 years ago now at the beginning of our medical school journey I frequently got the advice, “Live your own life. Don’t wait around for him.”

It was a warm day in Toronto, Saleh came to visit me over one of his golden weekends from New York City where he had recently matched as an Obstetrics and Gynecology resident.

An excerpt from “Rhythms of Relationship: A Guide for Creating Purpose Patterns to Strengthen Your Marriage”

Nearly four hundred years ago, the English physician William Harvey published De motu cordis, which proposed a revolutionary idea: that a small amount of blood recirculates and sustains the whole human body.

I’ll never forget March 13, 2020. It was Elliot’s first shift assessing patients with presumed COVID. He was asked if he was interested in swabbing patients in the ER while on a Sports Medicine rotation.

It was a frosty Friday evening and I was getting ready to meet my boyfriend’s colleague and his wife. Eric worked with Cornie in a small 6-physician family practice clinic in a rural community called Winkler - population 6500.

When you think of values that make up a strong relationship, words like trust, love, empathy come to mind. But how about independence?

Are you really feeling the stress these days? Yeah friend...me too. As if living in the midst of a pandemic wasn’t enough, you throw in an election of epic proportions, financial considerations, jobs, kids of any kind (fur babies or otherwise) plus a MEDICAL marriage?

I was 12 years old when my dad first signed me up for canoe school. That involved an intense weekend of whitewater paddling on the beautiful Mulberry River in northwest Arkansas.

Doctors and their families live the glamourous life, yes?

Someone recently told me that she never would have guessed that I had experienced any struggles in my medical marriage. Say what?!

I haven’t quite gotten used to night float. I end up staying up late into the wee hours of the night, waiting for Lu to return home. The flickering of the lights, the movement of my hair out of the corner of my eye, tricks me into thinking she’s here.

It was about two weeks after we were married, I packed up what remaining possessions I had left at my parents and at a small storage unit I was renting to move with my husband to a new state as he started medical school.

Being married to someone with a demanding and powerful career has potential to have an unfortunate impact on the psyche of the spouse. In my case, I’m married to an Orthopedic Surgeon, and he’s killin’ it in his career.

In our anxiousness to create meaningful and lasting relationships with a spouse, children, parents, siblings and friends it’s all too easy to neglect the most important relationship of all: the relationship we have with ourself.

remember thinking it was hard being away from family from the second we set foot in Pennsylvania for medical school. That was before kids. At that point, “hard” meant, “I miss my mom! I wish I could go raid her fridge.” The definition of “hard” changed when we had our son, Cannon.

Amongst the current COVID-19 chaos, are you taking time to be kind to yourself? Seriously, are you treating yourself with the kindness you deserve?

The Long And Winding Road...not just the title of a classic Beatles’ song, but also a great analogy to describe the life of a medical spouse. It is finally March, spring is in the air...wait, STOP! That version is from another story, not ours.

Hello & Welcome! My hope is that this Blog will provide an intimate and unfiltered look into the myths and magic of medical marriage, motherhood and everything in between. My vascular surgeon husband, John and I have been married since 2006.