To New Chapters. To New Friends.

I'm here! Officially and completely living in Kansas City. The next chapter has begun and things are off to an incredible and hectic start. I think that would be the title of my autobiography if I ever wrote one. Incredible and Hectic: Story of my life. 

Let's play a little catch up shall we??? I promise to tell all my tales from Europe, but in a separate post. I started to scribble them down here and realized I have too much to cover in one place.

I arrived back state side almost a month ago completely jetlagged and eager to move in to my new apartment. I had just a couple days wait before the whole move in process got started and when Monday rolled around grandma and I were off towards my KC adventure. 

Overall the move went smoothly and painlessly. The truth is I had so little to move that the movers spent a good portion of their time taking videos off the balcony. During my adult life, I've never bought furniture and have had various hand-me-downs from different family members. I knew that I wasn't going to be putting any of the furniture into the new apartment and I left all those things behind. I hired a wonderful interior designer and set out on my first experience furnishing an home. 

It has been a very fun and expensive project, but if you walked into this apartment you would have no idea.

From the moment you unlock and just crack the door open it is just breathtaking and unbelievable....or uhh it appears as if some warehouse took over an apartment. Cardboard boxes everywhere! So basically I currently live in a very fancy box graveyard with an incredible view. The first week, I had plastic silverware and paper plates, I was pretty sure I had knives in one of those boxes, mattresses on the floor, forgot I didn't pack sheets, and a couple of towels in the bathroom. I wish I could tell you that I have taken leaps and bounds in the settling in department since then, but the truth is that I'm taking baby steps every day. 

The first piece of furniture to arrive was the bookshelf for the guest room and let me tell you it looks fabulous! And this little badass over here put it together all my by self! The first hiccup is when they delivered the rug to our package room and I realized I can't carry a 9 ft tall object by

myself. (Thanks Dad!) I now also have a desk. No chair for the desk yet, but we are moving on up.

So in review, still sleeping on mattresses on the floor, eating on lawn chairs in the living room, put together a bookshelf and a desk, and anxiously awaiting the rest of my furniture. I took a big step yesterday and finally picked out some counter stools!

My biggest priority upon moving in actually wasn't furniture at all. It was making friends.  I had this incredible group of friends in Little Rock that I already miss dearly and here I was in a new place where I didn't know anyone. I have always been of the belief that I am terrible at making friends and I feel like we can all relate that making friends gets way harder as you get older. Somehow making friends was easy though. By the end of the first week I had met a few girls who I knew I was going to love. And after starting work last week it turns out there is another girl starting with me who is going to be my neighbor and very likely my work wife. I don't know what I did in the last life to get this kind of karma, but I'm loving it! I may also be dabbling in some dating..

So for the big question....

What is it like your first week as an Attending???

First I'll give just a little perspective for those who don't know the full structure of the journey to get to be an Attending. As a resident, you take care of your own patients, but you always have a supervising doctor, an attending. As you get further along in residency, they do less and less with your patients and eventually they become you sounding board on complicated patients and your safety net.

So last week, I walked into the hospital as an attending for the first time. I'd be lying to you if I said I wasn't nervous at all. I knew I would be doing the same thing I've been doing for the last 3 years and that I had received incredible training, but I was without my safety net. Without my person to tell me when I was screwing up. 

The entire experience is a bit surreal. I go in to do procedures I rarely if ever did without supervision and I look around for the attending. Then I mentally remind myself that I am the attending. Then I look around at my partners and think "are you sure none of you want to come watch me?" Don't get me wrong, I march right into those rooms and take care of the patient. I know what I'm doing, I have all the training, but it is a cultural change. I went from always being supervised to being the supervisor. I have people asking me what to do instead of the other way around. 

I've been reassured by one of my favorite attendings in Little Rock that this is normal and will pass...in a month or two. 

Everyone survived my first week of my big kid job, including me and my nurses. 

Once I get settled into this crazy new life, I'll start really getting into my goals for my new free time. Though I'm started to wonder if "free time" is just an illusion, because I'm still living this incredible, hectic life and free time is hard to come by. The herb garden has been planted. I tried my hand at homemade marinara with my sister, and I am actively trying to cook more now that I have a fully functional kitchen. And I'm here working on blogging. Free time may be hard to come by, but I'm still working on that short list of things I want to do now that I'm not a resident.

I'll get my Europe post out this weekend and from here on out my goal is to post each Sunday!

A Reboot, A Fresh Start, A New Chapter

Life never works out quite the way we plan it and good intentions don't always turn into results. I always hoped to keep this going while in residency, so imagine my surprise when I saw my last post was 8 months ago! Where has the time gone?!? I knew some time had passed, but 8 months? 

So came the next dilemma, it was time to start a new post after 8 months. Where did I start? Do I talk about the past, the recent past, the now, the future? I'm in such a weird transition place in my life that nothing seems very clear cut right now. So how about a little bit of all of the above?

The Past

For 6 weeks I lived in complete denial. Denial that everything in my life was about the be turned upside down and I was going to be pushed into the New Chapter of my life. Little Rock had become my home and I had a big family there. I made some of the best friends you could have in life during my 3 years. It was both the best and worst years of my life all at the same time. But even during the worst days, I had this amazing group who supported me even through my emotional moments. 

So needless to say, I was a little hesitant about accepting that this was all about the change. I was moving to a city where I didn't have any friends and was starting all over. My grandpa keeps telling me that it isn't starting over, but a continuation. I think he may be crazy. Yes,  yes life is continuing, but it was starting all over without this new family I had come to rely on. 

We made the most of it. We spent those 6 weeks hanging out every chance we got. Seeing everyone we could. Bordering on driving each other crazy. Several of us are extroverted introverts and alone time is so necessary, but with the countdown ticking loudly we saw each other every second we could. 

I spent a great deal of that time living with Shae after the break up. Sometimes the universe works in weird ways and I think the universe was pushing me to spend the time I had left where I needed to with one of my best friends. When I'm writing posts where I'm trying to catch up I never know the stories to tell, because I'm trying to cover so much. There are so many great stories from those last few weeks, but mostly it was a group of people laughing, drinking, and trying to fit in everything we could. 

As for the break up? Lots of lessons learned. 

When the goodbyes finally came, we all agreed it wasn't really goodbye and I set up a reminder in my calendar to text the crew every Sunday.

The Now

For 2 weeks, I have been trying to catch up on 3 years of time with my family. Actually making it to baby showers and graduation parties. Remembering where I came from. Most importantly being my favorite thing, Aunt Katie. 

My sister and I started a new monthly tradition to help me accomplish one of my new goals(more on that in a moment.) They will be known hence forth as Foodie Nights. We are going to try our hand at new dishes and push our cooking skills into new arenas. Last week we had our first Foodie Night and made Chicken with a Veloute garlic and herb sauce, homemade mac and cheese, and haricot verts. It was delicious! I can't wait to for the next one.

This week has been all about getting life into order. In 3 days, I am boarding a plane for my first trip to Europe! I am doing a solo adventure for 2 weeks before I return to move into my new apartment in KC. I'm very excited and nervous about the upcoming couple of weeks, but certain they are going to be wonderful. 

"As you move through this life and this world you change things slightly, you leave marks behind, however small. And in return, life — and travel — leaves marks on you. Most of the time, those marks — on your body or on your heart — are beautiful." -Anthony Bourdain

This vacation is all about adventure and exploring. No big to-do lists. No stress to see as much as I possibly can. Despite being my firsts time to Europe, this trip isn't about that. Instead I want to get lost in the culture, meet new people, slow down, give myself permission to do what I want, and most importantly not stress. I have a couple of things on the calendar. The kind of things you need tickets for, but otherwise I have a list of recommendations, books packed to read at cafes, and a plan to disconnect from my phone. After 10 years of working every second to get to the finish line, I'm teaching myself to smell the roses. 

The Future

So what does a 20-something girl(woman? badass?) do with her time after spending 10 years chasing the one big dream? The day before I graduated from residency, that was my sister's big question. What are you looking forward to? What are you going to do with your time? Uhhh, excuse me I'm over here swimming through denial. Lalalalalala. 

I have a great memory which is both awesome and sometimes terrible. So after my brain heard the, what are you going to do with life now question it wouldn't forget it. So what am I going to do? 

• Learn to make yummy sauces. I have such a love for the fancy, delicious sauces that come on chicken and fish at restaurants and I want to know how to make them or how to create them
• Grow a herb/spice garden. This goes along with the goal above. Fresh ingredients=delicious food
• Work on keeping my blog up to date and start writing again
• Learn to kayak and brush up on my swimming skills
• Travel. All the travel
• Train to hike the Alps next summer/fall
• Read more and figure out what I like to read now
• Become a yogi
• Learn to slow down
• Be that awesome, encouraging Aunt who makes it to almost everything even if it is just a couple minutes late.

No worries brain. I got us covered. Going to stay busy for sure!