Medical Resident
by Dr. Signout—Age 30—Atlanta, GA
There was never anything I loved as much or did as well as writing, and as far back as I can remember, I’ve wanted to be a writer. Still, I never pursued writing seriously because my folks convinced me it was impractical and lacked prestige. I found other things that reliably paid the bills and that were satisfying in their own way, but always felt torn about committing to anything professionally: when I started medical school six years ago, I felt like I was cheating on myself.
In part due to that feeling, I was not a rock-star medical student—I wasn’t even sure I wanted to do a residency until around the end of my third year. When I did opt to pursue residency, it felt like a choice between my academic self and my creative self. I signed my contract last May with no small sense of compromise.
I started blogging on my first day of residency, mostly with the intention of having a reliable outlet (and a reliable audience) for the stories I knew I’d want to tell. I still loved to write, and as I quickly found out, I loved to be read: it was incredibly gratifying to have family and friends call me to talk about subjects that had touched a nerve, and to have strangers read what I wrote and come back for more. There was something powerful in being known, in having the bright and dark parts of my professional development be even a tiny part of someone else’s world.
Beyond that, however, were benefits I never expected. Now, it feels as though rather than distracting me from writing, my days in the hospital give me boundlessly rich writing material, and my training has given new dimension to both my thinking and my writing. Even more surprisingly, writing for an audience has made me a better doctor; approaching my clinical work as a storyteller helps me find entire arcs of meaning and humanity in places where there would otherwise be just more work.
Finding that I can both write and be read while still training in medicine has helped me find a commitment and a joy in medicine that I never found before. Being a resident has made me a better writer, and writing regularly has made me a better, and happier, resident. I don’t feel trapped any more.
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