Tuesday, August 6, 2013

The End of Mike's First Year of Med School

For those of you who don't know, I married an All-Star.  While he has many titles--Water-skiier, Little Brother, Son, Husband, Friend, Student, Hard-worker, Lady-killer, to name a few-- most simply call him Mike.  My extended family also fondly/jokingly refers to him as "Dr. Mike," a title which I can see more and more as he progresses in med school.

This summer, I got to accompany "The Doctor" to Casper where he got to do what they call a "RUOP" for a month.  It entailed Mike shadowing some fine actual doctors working in various fields; specifically emergency medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, urology, and interventional radiology.  Mike loved the hands-on experience of getting to assist a c-section, take patient histories, witness two vaginal deliveries and countless surgeries to microwave tumors and bust up blood clots.  (You can read more about his experiences on his blog Wyoming's Watson).

NOTICE: The baby Mike's holding in the picture is not ours.  
It is a cool thing to see Mike come home, grinning from ear to ear because of something he just saw or got to help with.  Although Mike may not want to be an OBGYN someday, after witnessing his first vaginal delivery, he came in around 3am just shaking his head in a reverent way because of the miracle of life he'd just witnessed.  He kept telling me that "When the baby came out, I had to suppress this urge to start clapping!"  It makes me excited to have a cute little parasite of our own one day. :D



As a part of his RUOP, Mike also had to do some sort of project to promote health and wellness in the "rural community" of Casper.  For this, Mike did a "Bike to Work" campaign in the hospital.  He is a stud, and did, in fact, bike to the hospital almost every day we were there (except for the two times he popped a tire).

Mike's white coat ceremony
Even though he has grown up and into his own blog now, I just wanted to brag a bit about this pre-doctor husband I have.  He works hard even when his classes could be working him over.  He has this passion for learning and knowledge when he could get board and coast.  It's great to see someone you love whole-heartedly pursuing their dreams and still finding time to have such a balanced life, and I'm truly blessed to have him share all these aspects of his life with me.