Caca Crusaders
Just so you know, I have every intention of keeping up with my blog…it’s just going to be awhile before I can figure out how to balance my new life with my old hobbies. It seems like by the time the day is finally done, I’m so exhausted that I haven’t been able to find it in me to sit down and write. It’ll come back; it’s just a lot to juggle right now so most of my posts might be mindless and full of pictures for a few more weeks! At least it’ll keep serving as a family journal that way though. Oh, and as an update on my postpartum saga, my incision seems to be doing a little better. My OB stuck a LONG q-tip as far inside the wound as it would go to make sure it doesn’t track anywhere (aren’t c-sections awesome?!), and it really doesn’t. So, we’ll keep an eye on it and I’ll see her again in 2 weeks. I was happy to learn that as of Monday, I’m down 30lbs, 21lbs to go. The boob is better too, thanks for asking;) I appreciate all the great advice on mastitis - I especially liked the suggestion of dunking my boob in warm water before feeding Finley. I think I’ll try that just for the experience. Also, Yiayia (my grandma) is in town now helping me and I’m SO grateful she was able and willing to drop everything to come be with me. I thought I was emotionally stable, but after spending all of 1 half day alone, I don’t think I’m quite ready to be by myself just yet. Oh, and Travis cut his mullet!! It’s not reflected in these photos, but he really did. He’s no longer rockin’ the Kentucky Waterfall you’ll see in these pics (Jamie, thought you’d be happy to hear that;)!
There are more on the way of our munchkins, but here’s 1 picture our friend, Kevin, took of us at the park. Here’s his photography site - check it out.
So, our friends have all gone their own directions again and we’re going through ‘Caca Crusader’ withdrawal (that’s how we jokingly refer to our little group). Travis and I say all the time how we can’t figure out how lucky we got with our friends. We have such incredible people in our lives and have gotten so much support during our times of transition (how’s that for a euphemism:). It was so awesome to get some time to reconnect with our friends. One of the nights, after the babies had all gone to bed, the guys were drinking beers and joking around, and Dom, Sarah, Mel, and I had a chance to really talk. The crazy part was that the discussion eventually turned to “if you’d known then what you know now, would you do ‘it’ again” (’it’ being medical school). 3 out of the 4 of us said no, and the 4th said she’d have chosen a more lifestyle friendly field of medicine. I think for a lot of us, we chose medicine because we were idealists and it was more of a calling than a practical career choice. Then things changed when we had kids. The reality for me is, I committed to a profession that required me to go into massive amounts of debt upfront, and now I have to work just to pay that off and break even. The fact that it’ll take me 8-10 years to break even on my education investment is just insane. I have so many feelings on this topic, and I hope I can sit down at some point and really get them out. To be honest, it’s not total regret, but the way I feel about my choices is just complicated. It was just really nice (and therapeutic) for me to be able to talk about it with close friends who are in a similar boat with regards to family and career.
Here are a few fun pictures from our weekend with friends (me & babies, Dom & Cata, Mel & Ashlyn, Sarah & Bryson):
The “Caca Crusader” babies:
Jackson and his Godsister, Ashyln…I think this one sums up our attempted group photo shoot pretty well!
Brad (Jack’s Godfather) & Shane
Since we have an ongoing quote list from each of our family gatherings, I’ll keep record of it here on my blog too.
2nd ANNUAL Caca Crusader Family Reunion
Colorado, April 2008
1. “Yeah, our neighborhood looks like a set off the Truman Show, huh?†(Travis)
2. “It’s amazing…someone always has shit in their pants!†(Sarah)
3. “Man, I’m sorry my daughter bit your daughter.†(Kevin, to Brad)
4. Laurie to Jackson, “ Can you guess what’s on your nose?†Jackson: “Snack!†Laurie: “No, it’s a booger.â€
5. “Give ME the gold(fish).â€
6. “Check out the girl-on-girl action – it’s like Babies Gone Wild!†(Sarah)
7. Laurie regarding Jackson: “I’m not sure if this is normal, but it’s incredible how he tolerates a huge diaper full of caca.â€
8. “This pen is covered in something slimy.†(Melanie)
9. Melanie in reference to Jackson straddling Cata, who is spread eagle on the kitchen floor: “If we find you guys like that when you’re 16, you’re in big trouble!â€
10. Sarah: “The school he is in is actually no nuts. It’s a nut-free zone.†Travis: “heh heh.â€
11. Laurie: “Jackson, who lives in the cold?†Jackson: “Pen-jins.â€
12. Melanie: “Maybe we should take a naked group photo.†Travis: “Well, we’d need a wide-angle lens for Brad’s ass.â€
13: Melanie: “Are you sure you don’t want to get some stuff from the hotel?†Kevin: “Naw, I have milk, a tent, and bourbon. I’m good.â€
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17 comments
ha - those are hilarious quotes! And great pictures - looks like sooo much fun! Yeah for YiaYia! And I can’t wait to read your further thoughts on the whole carrer/family/medschool debt topic!
Nice list! And the pictures are fun too!
Laughing my a** off over here…kind of sounds like my family gatherings or as I refer to them “my time for new material”. Glad you had a good weekend and things are getting better for you!
And my favorite is:
Laurie to Jackson, “ Can you guess what’s on your nose?†Jackson: “Snack!†Laurie: “No, it’s a booger.â€
BTW I’m back- my 3 kiddos are kicking my butt, so my posts are kinda lame-o, but hey at least I’m tryin’
Maybe you could pick a field in medicine that has better hours, Anesthesiology or Radiology, then there is always Pathology.
You could make the money but have better hours.
I know a plastic surgeon with several kids and she only works part time and only does smaller surgeries. She has a playpen in her office and her mom is the receptionist. I think malpractice insurance for part time or limited practice is a lot lower.
You and your husband should try and get the same specialities or ones that complement the other so when you do practice you can share office expenses, staff, and call.
hilarious!
I vote for dermatology if you switch specialities…easy hours and plenty of cash.
love the shot of all the moms and kids. reminds me of our group from jeremy’s residency. We’re getting together at the end of June with all of the new babies
So good to see everyone is feeling better. I’m glad to hear your yia yia’s there too! Help is good!
The pictures and quotes were great!
I can’t even imagine how exhausted you must be. I hope you find a groove that works for you all soon!
Love the quotes! Glad you had a good time with friends and are feeling a bit better. I don’t think any of us will mind picture heavy posts of a while!
What?! The good doctor got rid of the WISCONSIN WATERFALL/ CAMERO CUT? What? That’s it - I’m switching doctors. HA HA HA. We have the same sense of humor - love it.
You must write about the med school stuff. I often consider med school but then I wonder how hard is it really.
Keep getting better and stronger everyday. Don’t lose all the weight-you need to keep the mamouth boobs incase you need to smother Mullet Man with them!
Hadn’t checked your blog lately because I figured you’d be swamped with all the company and the babies. Thankfully I have an 11 year old who’s just as hooked on you guys as I am and who looks in on you guys regularly. Glad to hear your C-section is better. I had the same problem with mine. I’ll never look at a cotton swab without cringing ever again……
Hi Laurie,
Beautiful pictures! I love the one of both babies crying. I know you must be extremely busy but if you have a chance can you email me? I was reading you previous post on ethical adoptions and I have a ? for you. I’d like to know where you found a PI. There’s a lot of holes in our girls story and I would love to investigate and find out more info.
Thanks!
that is it, I am going to medical school. Only so I hang out with people who laugh at stuff like that! Glad you are holding up.
I snorted my way through your list of quotes - man you guys must have had an awesome fun time. It’s amazing to think that it takes nearly a decade of hard work to pay back an education. Wow. Time to become a plastic surgeon??
I’m not sure who makes the most money though, maybe a paediatrician? Oh well.
*Loved* the photo’s of the kids - how cool that you have all these great memories!
Love the quotes!
On Friday a team of us were discussing m school regrets and comparing 1st year’s feelings (total naivity, I’m going to save the world and make a pretty $) compared to 5th years (mostly women who are mothers or want to be mothers) who often begin to think this may not be the right profession for their family goals. I am incredibly lucky I was in a program that had a Public Health stream, which is what I went straight into, it is now defunct and I have yet to hear of any others that allow this, but I know plenty who went into various streams who are now working in public health, scrambling to get public health qualifications so that they can have a more family friendly work life.
Don’t get me started on the cost of University in the US and to a lesser degree Canada. It is another reason why I’m pretty sure I’m staying put. Over here, our students pay a maximum of equivilent to $6000 (US) a year MAX, but children from poorer backgrounds, mature students, students with children can pay nothing depending on the circumstances, it’s a sliding scale with 6K US at the top and fees going down from there. They do also get a wage from gov’t to help. Other health care professions like OT, Physio, nursing, midwifery, dentistry, hygeine etc all get fully funded places and grants for living costs so Uni is “free”. You know what the funny thing is, here they ALL complain about the cost and how unfair it is, how Uni should be free, there is some thought it may eventually go back to being totally free, but I’m amazed at the comparrison.
Perhaps another reason why you meet a lot of American families who move here when their children are school age? That coupled with free health care, prescriptions (dependent on age and other factors), dentistry (the max you are allowed to be billed for treatment is about $300 US), OT, Physio, Speech and the list goes on.
Health inequalities is my speciality - particularly health inequalities effecting maternal and child health, I will never be able to comprehend why (well I know why but you get what I mean) wealthy countries still have such horrific differences between the health of the rich & the poor, the higher SES groups and the vulnerable people… It is unforgivable - although obviously developing countries have even more horrific health discrepancies…
Sorry, rant over and to think I even had to tone down this post a few times!
p.s. A friend of mine who is a GP (Family Doc) has 3 young children - she decided to have a very small practice, she works 20 hours a week, does home visits, has a smaller case load - basically modelled her own practice on the system here. She is in a private practice with 3 other Dr’s who all are mom’s as well and didn’t want to get intoorporate medicine. I think they each do 20 hrs a week, obviously overlapping on some days. She has found once she was able to get to her own practice, she was able to combine motherhood and medicine positively. It did mean she had children slightly later than she would have hoped (first baby at 32 1/2 she finds doing 20 hrs over 3 days a week works really well. She also takes off 9 months with each baby, then works for 2-3 years before the next baby etc.
One of the Dr’s on the public health course (she was doing some re-training) who had 4 young children and only worked 1 day a week - she had a specialist practice (but I’m pretty sure worked for a non-profit NGO) in teenage pregnancy. She said all the men in her program thought she was nuts!!!
Saw a facinating interview with this lady http://www.perchhill.co.uk/ was a Dr, left it so she could be with her children and now runs a gardening business, a very successful one I might add!
Forst who could be busier than you - second no big deal about the pictures I love looking at them and finally this post is so funny! Thanks for taking the time to write and post it!
I LOVE the picture of the family!! It is so great!
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