hmm

It's been a while since I've last blogged, but I've become inspired by you few compulsive readers who still click on my blog several times a day.

I haven't written partly because nothing that exciting is going on (hard to beat all those trauma stories), and partly because the things in my head are starting to sound like a broken record (hmm...do 'kids these days' know what we mean when we say something sounds like a broken record?).
Also, I may have gone through a brief addiction to free online episodes of "Scrubs", which one can find on www.dailymotion.com, and which I may have watched more than a hundred of (5 seasons) in the last two weeks. That binging period of my life ended a few night ago when I forced myself to watch the last few episodes and move on with my life. (Yes, season 6 starts Thursday)

So the broken record continues to inspire me with daily anxiety about my future.

Do I choose Trauma Surgery where I was most engaged, happy and appreciated, but say goodbye to any chance of a normal life, family, non-medical existence?

Or do I decide that investing my entire self into my career would not make me happy in the long run, and choose a direction with more flexibility, though it might not allow me to do everything I would like to be able to do in medicine?

I could do ER, but never have continuity with my patients. I could choose internal medicine, and then never have the adrenaline of ER and trauma, or the immediate gratification of surgery.

I could choose pediatrics because kids really are fun to hang out with all day long and never see adults and forget how to manage heart disease, diabetes, and hypertension. Or I could choose internal medicine and never work with kids professionally.

They say that people who like everything should go into family medicine, but there are many things that hold me back from that profession. First of all, I'm old enough and have been previously disappointed enough times to know that you just can't have everything. By dabbling in a 3 year residency that exposes you to everything, I'm afraid that only the smartest people with the best memory can retain enough to be fairly good at all those things. More likely, your job becomes that of a poorly paid, unrespected pill-dispenser, who hopefully doesn't get too bored or lazy to miss the occasional really sick patient who should be referred to a specialist who can help them. If you are compassionate enough you might help many of your patients stay healthy and make good choices in their lives, but you are just as likely to become numb and cold to all those patients who too overwhelmed, too selfish, too needy, or just too stupid and lazy to do anything good for themselves (stories coming up soon).

Ah... Happy thoughts. About now, you might be wondering to yourself why you read all the way through. Sorry, next one will be a little less self-absorbed.