National Doctor's Day
Happy National Doctor's Day to my fellow doctors out there! Who knew that there was even such a thing as Doctor's Day? I found out on social media, typical. Today seems like a good day to pause for a moment to think about my educational journey and what it means to me to be a doctor. I am writing this today because those who know me well, know that medical school and residency training have been brutal. It's supposed to be brutal, it's how you learn and grow as a physician. In the everyday grind and long hours, it is easy to forget why I went into medicine at all. But, when I take a minute to reflect, I remember what lead me to a career in medicine and why I still love it today. Here is some of my story:When I started medical school at the age of 24 I thought for sure that I wanted to be an OB/GYN. I was interested in the birth process and thought that catching babies was going to be the best thing ever. After my 3rd year clinical training, I quickly decided that OB/GYN was not for me. When I really thought about it, I realized that what drew me to OB/GYN was this thought that I was going to be taking care of a family at its very beginning and that was going to be magical. Instead what I got on my OB/GYN month was: me rushing in to deliver a baby, handing it off to mom and then never taking direct care of the baby again. It actually made me sad. As a family medicine doctor I get to meet my patients before they get pregnant, do their obstetrical care, deliver their baby, and then care for mom and baby after. I also get to care for dad, grandma, uncle, and older sister too. It is awesome. As it turned out, what I really love doing is taking care of entire families; "cradle to grave". I'm glad that I figured that out before I graduated from medical school.
After medical school I started my family medicine residency training. During that time I have cared for patients in clinic settings, ORs, ERs, hospitals, birthing units, urgent cares, ICUs, etc., and I think that I have finally found my true passion within family medicine. In case it is not obvious, my passion is using food and lifestyle for disease prevention, health maintenance, and chronic disease treatment. I spent the first few years of my training focusing on learning how to screen people for illness, and then how to treat them with pills and procedures. The concept of disease prevention seemed so impossible in the beginning. I thought that I could never encourage people to take better care of their bodies. To be honest, at that time, I wasn't taking very good care of my own body either.
In the US today it seems like a normal thing for people to develop heart disease, diabetes, and cancer. We kind of joke about it when we are admitting a patient to the hospital. We say things like, "this is a 67 y/o female, she has all of the "regular" medical problems: obesity, hypertension, hyperlipidemia, coronary artery disease status post CABG (aka she has heart disease and had bypass surgery), diabetes on insulin, and chronic kidney disease. She is presenting today with chest pain...again". It took me a year and a half as a resident to stop and think: "actually, none of those diseases are normal or the 'regular things'." It is normal to be healthy. It is normal to not take pills everyday. At this point, my mind was blown. You pretty much know what happened after that. I started with myself first by eating a plant based diet, getting more regular exercise, and managing my stress (that is a daily struggle still). Then I started to encourage my patients to work towards a disease preventing lifestyle as well...which is a work in progress. Now I am dabbling with social media to see if I can get even more people moving toward health.
For me becoming a doctor has been a long and difficult journey. I am grateful for all of the experiences, good and bad, that have brought me to this point though. I am pumped to be finishing my residency this summer and to move on to the next chapter in my career. "The best is yet to come..."
Thanks for following along and for reading!
Best health,
Dr. G
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