A Day in the Life of a Med Student

Bobby is now a third year med student- wahoo! Classes are over and rotations have begun (I like to call it "playing doctor"). :) For the next 4 weeks he will be at Chestnut Hill Hospital on a General Surgery rotation. Yesterday was only Day 2 on the "job", but it was anything but uneventful. Let me fill you in on some highlights of his day:

During a colonoscopy with a patient who had a highly infectious disease (I'm not sure how much detail I'm allowed to put here for patient privacy?? Let's just say this patient had something that you definitely don't want to get)- anyways, while the attending surgeon was injecting medication into the patient the needle broke and sprayed the medication everywhere. Of course my husband was standing right next to him and got sprayed all over. The likelihood of contracting anything is about one in a bajillion, but just to be safe and to follow procedure the nurses and doctors sent Bobby down to the ER to have his eyes flushed out (some got on his glasses) and to have some blood tests done. Everything looks fine and we're not worried about anything. Of course when he called me to tell me what happened I almost burst into tears, but I blame that more on my preggie hormones than anything else. I feel fine now. :)

Later in the day the chief resident was giving assignments to the students to do with the other residents. Someone needed a surgical consult (for something, I can't remember what), so Bobby volunteered for that one (because the chief resident said it would be "quick and easy"). He started to follow the resident, assuming he was going to the consult as well, but it turns out that he wanted Bobby to do it by himself!! He gave Bobby a quick list of specific questions to ask and sent him on his way. Bobby spent 20 minutes going over the patient's chart, then went into the room to start the consult (sweating bullets, no doubt). Immediately after he introduced himself and told the patient why he was there, the patient's daughter said, "This is the first time we've heard of this procedure. Are you sure you have the right room?" Sure enough, he was in the wrong room. He found the correct patient and the correct room and proceeded with the consult as scheduled. Good thing they give students lots of training and practice before they ship them off to be real doctors. But maybe that's why they call it "practicing medicine"- because you're always practicing and getting better. It's not a definite science, that's for sure!

Despite these events, Bobby is having a good time and he feels like he's learning a lot. He stayed at the hospital until about 8 pm to help one of the residents with a patient in the ER. I'm very proud of how far he's come in school and how well he's dong! The day that we can call him "Dr. D" isn't that far away!

English as a Second Language

A few weeks ago my church asked me to help teach a beginner/low intermediate ESL (English as a Second Language) class. The first class will be this morning in a couple of hours! I'm teaching a really simple (hopefully not too boring) lesson on how to introduce yourself and others.

We don't know exactly who our students will be, or how many we'll have yet. I know of 2 that are coming from my local ward- one is an older gentleman who's native language is Italian. He lives with his daughter and her 4 teenage children. The other is an older lady from Germany who is visiting her daughter and family for a few months. There's a significant African population in the area, so I assume that the majority of students will be from that area. We'll just have to wait and see!

I'm a little nervous about teaching, since it's been 2 years since I graduated with my Master's in Teaching ESL and I haven't taught it in a long time. But it's been exciting to get all my old books out and to plan a lesson! Teaching methods and learning strategies have been slowly coming back to me....hopefully they keep coming!

Teaching English is such a rewarding experience and I'm really looking forward to being involved with this class. English can seem so boring, but it's actually quite entertaining. I would recommend it to anyone. To prove my point, here's a funny commercial for ESL software. It circulated around my Master's program for a while:



Here's another funny one from Steve Martin's Pink Panther. Sooo funny, I can't help myself!! :)

Happy Memorial Day!

Here's our little American, wishing a Happy Memorial Day to her Uncle Paul and to all of the government officials and military personnel who are serving our country (as well as those who have served in the past). We are grateful for your service! And especially to Uncle Paul- we love you and we miss you!

The Ending of an Era

About a month and a half ago Bobby and I decided to take Lillian's much-beloved "chupie" away. If you're not familiar with the vocabulary at our house, "chupie" is just another way to say binkie, pacifier, passy, ba-boo, or whatever you may call it at your house. Lillian started calling her's an "uh-oh" because that's what I would always say when it would drop on the floor and bounce away, which was quite often.

In any case, the big green chupie has officially gone "bye-bye" and is "all done." I was surprised at how easy it was to take away and how little Lillian asks for it. I was sure she was a hard core addict and that she would suffer from severe withdraw when we took it, but the process has been mostly painless. She probably cries a little more without it, but a few more tears won't hurt her.

Now I have quite a collection of chupies that I don't know what to do with. I have to keep them hidden from Lillian becuase if she sees them she is suddenly reminded of her old habit and feels the addictive urge to start it again. At $4-$5 for a 2-pack, I just can't bring myself to destroy them, although that would probably be the most sanitary thing to do. I'm sure that recycling them isn't a good idea, no matter how economically or environmentally sensitive I'm trying to be. :/

In memory of the days of old, here are some classic chupie pics!

2 months


6 months - "must get chupie!!"


12 months


15 months


18 months


20 months - the last chupie pic we have!


22 months - chupie free and loving life!

Forget New Year's Resolutions!

They don't work!! :) I apologize to everyone who has been relentlessly checking and rechecking my blog only to be disappointed with the same old post time after time.

Summer is just around the corner, so it's time for a fresh new start!

Yesterday our friends Brandon and Melanie came to visit with their 8-month old Zoey. She is the best baby I've ever seen! She never cried!!

We went the the Jamaican Jerk Hut for lunch (as seen on In Her Shoes). We ate jerk chicken, curry chicken, and snapper (with the head and everything still attached!). Then we saw the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, and all those horse drawn carriages.


It took a while to get around because Lillian insisted on pushing her own stroller all by herself. She's still a little too short to reach the handle bars and she can't see over the top, so she was driving blind and kept running into things. Not to mention it was her nap time, so exhausted frustration eventually took over and resulted in an emotional melt-down. Thank goodness Daddy was there to carry her on his shoulders while Mommy pushed her empty stroller. I honestly don't know why we even bother with strollers in the first place because that's usually what ends up happening.


After our friends left we had other friends, Susan and Dave, over for a BBQ. They're moving to Indiana tomorrow and we're really going to miss them!! Their son Jarom is almost 6 and he loves playing with Lillian- well, at least he does a great job playing with her, who, of course, follows him around and thinks he's the greatest thing in the world! While we were waiting for the food to finish on the grill, they found one of Lillian's little balls and Jarom would throw it and Lillian would retrieve it like a little puppy! After dinner they spent the rest of the time playing in the car. Lillian was in the driver's seat as always, and Jarom was in the passenger's seat playing with Lillian's toy laptop. They make such a great pair!

Btw, Susan and Dave's house is up for rent, so if you or someone you know needs a place to live in Philly, let us know!!