a post about my resident spouse

On the Red Butte trail watching the sunset. 

Everyone told us residency would be hard. For both of us in different ways. So I started by lowering my expectations for myself, especially since I am pregnant. We are now nearing the end of Dave's 3rd rotation.

Just as an interjection for those who may not know exactly what it is Dave is doing - He is working primarily at Primary Children's Hospital. Every 4 weeks he rotates through a different branch of pediatrics - adolescent medicine, cardiology, etc. He also has outpatient clinic every week. At the end of 3 years, he will be a licensed pediatrician. Or he can continue on a do a 1-3 year fellowship in a specialty. He will apply for those during 2nd year if he wants to. Also sometime during this year, he has to take (and pass) Step 3 of the United States Medical Licensing Exam, which is a 2 day test. 

His first rotation was a pretty easy schedule, but he decided to get Step 3 out of the way right away so he was studying for that. We found out recently that he passed, which is awesome and he is glad to have it out of the way. The next rotation was "wards"  which is what most people generally think of as residency - long hours at the hospital almost every day. It was long and it was stressful, but I felt like I came through it all right.  Most of the time I felt like I played the role of the supportive wife pretty well. He worked hard and I did what I could to be his supporting cast.

I noticed something amazing about my husband too. When he had such limited time off, he wanted to make it count. He would take a kid to the library or to the store. He would come home for just a minute and ask if there was anything he could do for me. And even if he was really tired, he would curl up with the kids and watch a movie with them. It was amazing.

And then I got all full of myself and thought, "Okay, I have got this. I can do this resident wife stuff."

This rotation is split it two; the first two weeks were called Safe and Healthy Families which pretty much means you are dealing with families who are NOT safe and healthy. (Abuse, mostly.) But the schedule was pretty easy. The last two weeks are night shift at the hospital - just like wards but at night.

It has been rough. I don't do well with the night shift thing. Once I am asleep I am okay, but I am totally unmotivated to get myself there. And there is the what-to-do-during-the-day-while-daddy-is-sleeping issue. The older kids are in school, so that helps. Truth be told Dave is a pretty deep sleeper so that is good. Still it changes routines and schedules and trying to figure out when to eat dinner and what to fix and all of that stuff has been really stressful.

Then last night, while working his night shift, he started with some pain that got so bad that he ended up dragging himself to the ER. He has a fairly descent size kidney stone. They sent him home with some pain meds but he couldn't keep them down and when he did they didn't seem to be working. So tonight, though it was supposed to be his "night" off, he is up at the hospital again, as a patient.

Luckily for me, we landed ourselves in an amazing ward. We made one phone call and had someone over to give him a blessing.  My visiting teacher came to my rescue to watch my kids while I took Dave up AND fed us an amazing dinner. We are so lucky to be here.

As I sit here and type this all out, I feel really, amazingly blessed. Dave is such a smart, hardworking husband and I am so lucky to have him. He has such a strong desire to be a good dad and husband and to be an example of a Christian.  Even though the last couple days have been stressful and a little crazy, the Lord sends his tender mercies in simple things like a text from a sister saying that she understands, and the chance that my friend was home this evening when usually they eat Sunday dinner with extended family. God does not forget us.

Isaiah 49:15-16

 Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.

Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me.

school days

School is back in session.

I do love the school year. I love getting the kids on the bus and walking to pick them up in the afternoon. I love the quiet days with just me and Katie. I had such good intentions of getting the house all cleaned up this week, but truthfully the schedule change has been rough for me. The kids have adjusted fine, but I have been a lot sicker than I had been the week before. So I mostly took it easy this week. I did manage to get all the laundry washed, dried and put away. And the kitchen has stayed mostly tidy. I need to get Katie some regular social interaction, though. She won't leave my presence.

Jack has a ton of homework. At first I was like Really? In 1st grade? But I actually enjoy sitting down with him after dinner is all cleaned up and helping watching him do it. He is a bright kid. He is usually not too long in finding some sort of afternoon activity to occupy himself. All summer long he acted so bored. But when school is out he just walks in the door, eats a snack and then goes quietly about an activity. Yesterday it was building a web of yarn with a friend in our driveway. The day before it was building some sort of invention with a box and a hanger and some other stuff from the recycling box. My house is filling up with his robots and inventions and I am not quite sure what the acceptable "keeping" time is and when I can stop stepping over them. He seems happy to go and happy to come home. But he needs his unwind time. We do homework after dinner so they can have that time.

Ana loves school if nothing else than the fact that her 2 closest friends are in her class. She lives and breathes a social life. She isn't home more than 2 minutes before she is skipping out the door to find someone to play with her. Of course, if she can't find anyone she moans and groans, but she usually has good luck. She has all positive things to say about school and she even has her school calendar hanging up in her room so she knows what to expect when. Upcoming field trips, no school days, etc.

I feel good in the settling of life and the routines, with a little fun and adventure mixed in.

last week of summer

With taking the kids out of school early for our move, this summer has been LONG. I am ready for school to start next week.

As this week was approaching I kept vascillating between what kind of a week we were going to have. Was I going to get my nose to the grindstone and have the kids work work work all week to make the house all nice and spotless or was I gonna just relax and let them relax and have fun. My "what good mommy's SHOULD do" radar was telling me to do the first. But my "Erin" radar was telling me the latter. All in all, I decided somewhere in between. We spent yesterday at the zoo and Monday at a park and I think I will take them to a museum this afternoon. But we do need to clean bedrooms first because as it is they won't be able to find anything come the first day of school. Ana, through diligent teethbrushing earned getting her ears pierced. She had been begging and so I figured we could compromise and she could earn it. It does look pretty cute.

On Tuesday Dave got off work early so he could go to my doctor's appointment with me. I ended up waiting for FOREVER because I guess I wasn't checked in, even though I thought I was and so that was a pain. But it was pretty exciting because we found out:

So, that's pretty exciting. I was thinking girl, so I was surprised. It definitely makes the sleeping arrangements easier because Ana was really petitioning to move upstairs with the baby. But now it is settled nicely.

The kids found out who their teachers are for school and are exciting because they each have a good friend in their class. Dave and I were reflecting last night about how blessed we have been to find this neighborhood. When deciding our rank list, I was especially worried about finding a good neighborhood here in Utah that would fit our needs. One of our main concerns was the social aspect for Ana. In Vermont, we did not go to church with even 1 little girl her age. She had great friends at school and church, but we lived so far away from them that it was hard for to really form good friendships. We prayed that we would find some place that had good friends for Ana: kids her age that she could run around with all summer and still see at school and church and have that continuity of friendships. Finding this place has been perfect. The kids in the neighborhood are kind and fun and they want to play with her.  Not all of them go to church and not all of them go to the same school, but they all have welcomed her.  The ward is great. Everyone we talk to really likes the school. Plus it is a short commute for Dave. I know that we could not have found such a perfect place without God's guidance. We were led to it.

We have a few more fun activities planned for the weekend. (Since Dave has the WHOLE WEEKEND OFF! Hooray!) and then school starts and it will just be me and little Katie for a few months before little brother joins us in January. Things have a way of working out just right.

the last 10 days

Sometimes you have weeks where you find out your uncle died and then the next day is your daughter's birthday party which is 3 days before your other daughter's baptism which is the day before your family reunion that has to be re-planned so that you can go to your uncle's funeral and then you finally get home from said funeral/family reunion and your daughter throws up for 2 days.

It's those kind of weeks where you give yourself a mommy stay-cation by letting your kids watch far too much television and you thank your lucky stars that your awesome new neighbor asked if she could bring you dinner. (And you said yes.)

our summer

First of all, there is this:

So naturally, there has been a lot of this: 

Because I am dead tired and nauseated all. the. time. But that's how it goes.

There has also been this:

Which I never get tired of. Even if our swamp cooler is marginal at best and it is stinking hot. I am not complaining.

And there is all of this:

So overall, I am not complaining. Life is good, my friends. Life is good.

30

The family at Mount Rushmore

My 30th birthday came and went last month. It was just 5 days after we arrived into town and we spent the day with my sister Shari, who bought Muppet cupcakes and let the kids pick out presents for me (Mary Poppins and a swimsuit that didn't quite fit. :) ) and then our niece watched the kids in the evening while Dave and I enjoyed an Arctic Circle milkshake.

Many woman I know dread the big 3-0, but I welcomed it. It seems like the threshold of adulthood. Sure we have been married 9 years with 3 children and have been living on our own and being all independent and stuff, but NOW I am an adult.


I remember this woman that I used to babysit for. In fact I traded piano lessons for babysitting. Now I think she was getting a great deal, but I was happy to do it at the time. She had all these little kids and was so confident and laid-back. Her oldest was probably Ana's age at the time, maybe a little older. *  I think of her quite often now. I am sure she wasn't perfect. Her house usually needed to be tidied up a bit, like mine, but she sure didn't seem hung up on it and pre-occupied and apologetic of it like I am. I want to be like her. She was so comfortable with who she was that she never seemed ruffled by appearances.  She was just real and genuine and happy. Being around her made you feel good.  My goal for my 30s is to be like that.  I probably won't ever be as laid back as she was, but I can be just as comfortable with who I am.  I don't have to seek for the approval of others. I can just be me.

This doesn't mean that I subscribe to the "This is how I am, take it or leave it" philosophy because I absolutely don't. I believe people can change and should strive to be Christlike and kind and that everyone should have worthy and attainable goals that we are working towards. In the strength of the Lord we can accomplish great things and become better, even different, people.

But I do believe we can be comfortable with who we are along the process of progression. It is a process. Seeking others' approval, passive-aggressive behavior, and defending my actions (or inactions) along the way don't help me change. In fact they inhibit real, true growth. 

So the question is, How? What am I going to do differently in my 30s? I can't do what I have always done, react as I have always reacted, speak as I have always spoken, and somehow expect to feel differently. I think I found at least part of the answer in a conversation with my mom a couple weeks ago. We were talking about people who always uplift those around them and how we want to be like that. They are gracious and kind. And they are also comfortable with who they are. So perhaps the more we seek to love others, the more comfortable we become with who we are because we no longer are seeking their approval. Our focus becomes outward instead of inward.

Songwriter Hilary Weeks said, "Don't worry about what others think of you. Worry about what others think of themselves when they are with you." And while I realize that I can't take responsibility for how others feel about themselves, I can seek to lift. I have realized that the more I seek to gain the approval of others, the more I offend them. But if I am focused on building others up, we are both elevated. Maybe that's off the subject, but I know that my friends that I am closest with, the ones that  I know absolutely accept me and love me, the ones I feel totally in my element around, are the ones that I stopped trying to impress long ago and started to just genuinely love and care for them. They are the ones who have been vulnerable around me, and I them. We dropped our defenses and simply loved each other. (That doesn't mean we always agree. Some of those friends have very different opinions about lots of different things than I do. We can have discussions and debates about things and go away every bit as friends.)

So here's to my 30s. I think they will be good. I don't know if by the time I am 40 I will be able to check this goal off my list of "things to accomplish" but I think the perspective is a good start. 

*That girl I used to babysit now has a kid. Weird.

making a house a home

This last weekend we went up to Idaho for a few days. We went fishing with Dave's brother, celebrated Jack's birthday, stayed up way too late, and went to church in our old Rupert ward. It was wonderful.

By the time we were driving home last night a vague homesickness set in. Usually after a trip, the drive home feels like a relief, but this time it didn't. Our walls are still bare. I still haven't unpacked my boxes of books (something that always makes me feel more at home) and it is strange that my calendar is relatively empty. It doesn't quite feel like home yet. It will. I love our new neighborhood and our house is great. We got a new couch that I really love. But I am still figuring out where to put things and how to organize stuff and all of that. It takes time. I know it does.

I had a dream the other night that we were done with residency and it was time to move again and I couldn't believe it had gone so fast and I felt like we had just barely moved and I couldn't bring myself to do it again. It has been an exhausting journey, even though it is exciting. Transitions can be hard.

The night before we left Vermont I lay our our little cot in our mostly empty house. Four years before I had done the same thing, and our empty house felt full of promise and hope for the future. This time, though all of our stuff was packed tightly (very, very tightly) in our moving truck, the house didn't feel empty at all. It felt full of ghosts. The ghosts of our memories that filled the house to the brim. Memories of Christmas mornings and lazy Sunday afternoons and the smell of lilacs through the windows and dinners with friends and so many other wonderful things that happened in that house. It was a four year process of making that house a home. And I cried.

The same with happen with this house. We will fill it with so many memories that in a few short years when we pack it up I will cry. And it will feel like home.

May 2014 - Last day

July 2010 - First day in our new home

Dr. Larsen

This month as been a big month for us.  We celebrated our 9th anniversary, Grandma and Grandpa came to Vermont, we packed, we moved across the country and to round it out, tomorrow is my 30th birthday. But of all of those things, the biggest and best day of them all was this day:

This was the reason we moved to Vermont in the first place, the reason we have so many wonderful friends, and came to love one of the most beautiful places on earth. We went so Dave could be a doctor. And now he is! I am so proud of him for all the work he did over the last 4 years. Time flew by. I always say that I am amazed at all the stuff he knows now that he didn't know 4 years ago. He was a stellar student, and yet still managed to be there for us as his family and for his friends and for our church family. I am so lucky to call him mine!

Congrats, Dr. Larsen!

My thoughts have been a swirling mass in my head. So many times over the last 2 weeks I have thought, "I need to write." But with graduation and moving and all the emotional and physical energy those things take, I found that I had little left for writing. I don't usually like to play catch up when is write because I feel the raw emotions I felt at the time are lost in retrospect. But there are too many things that I missed and I can't possibly skip them. So I will do my best over the next few weeks to look back over this crazy month with as much authenticity as I can.

Right now I am sitting in a mostly empty house that we will call home for the next little while. We pulled in last night and the kids ran around excitedly and I walked more slowly taking it all in. I am excited for the chance to make this little home our own. Change is always hard and strange. Vermont was so incredibly good to us. My one consolation is that do many people that we love have ties to Utah. Not to mention all of the family and friends that I have that live close by.  I am confident that it will be wonderful.

The sun is shining and there isn't a cloud in the sky. We have a beautiful view of the mountains and a home to fill to the brim with love and memories. I think I am gonna like it here.

quebec, quebec city - come on *

I know, you were all expecting a mother's day post. I should write something poetic about all the mothers in my life or my mother or what being a mother means to me. I may still, but not tonight. I tried to do this post a few days ago but my internet was being weird. Seriously, though, this month is slipping by like sand through my fingers. The harder I try to grasp it the faster it is going. 

Anyway....

For spring break we planned on taking the whole the week to go to New Hampshire, Maine and then up to Quebec City. But we ended up shortening our last trip to just Quebec City. We went with some of our very best friends, the Dahles. I wish I got a picture of all of us together, but somehow that didn't happen. It was an awesome trip. Good friends, good food and a great place to enjoy it all. Luckily for us, we had a french speaker among us, which made this so much better, because I get awkward when I can't understand what people are saying. We walked a lot, but the kids did great. Saturday was rainy, so we didn't do quite as much that day, but it was still awesome. On Sunday we went to mass at a super old church, which was really cool.

And now, the pictures:

on the road. Dave is wearing my sunglasses. teehee.

Skinny alley

yummy Moroccan restaurant

Cool mural (on the right) and street

Quebec city is the only walled city in North America outside of Mexico This is part of the wall

The hotel Frontenac. This is wear D-day was planned.

From another angle

playing on the cannons

Cool walking street

Katie walked or was carried the whole time.

We stopped and let the kids play at this little park for a while.

Katie filled her shoes with sand.

There was still lots of snowpiles around

Happy

The kids loved the diorama and video about Quebec City at the Musee Du Fort.

A panoramic view of the diorama

Inside the hotel du Frontenac

We got yummy pastries at this little bakery. Look in the window. :)

Cool little street with Frontenac in the background

Cool square and church.

The kids. I am pretty sure they walked on every ledge in the entire city.

The Church where we went to Mass celebrates their 350th anniversary this year. The Vatican gave them a Holy Door to commemorate. It was really cool. You could only use it to enter the church and it had its own sanctuary.

A tiny picture of Katie and Dave giving thumbs up during lunch. So cute!

So there you have it. Quebec City was awesome and was my first real international experience. I have been to Montreal and Vancouver in Canada, but they felt very American. Quebec City totally does not. It was awesome and we made some great memories. Of course the kids just wanted to swim in the hotel pool the whole time, but I think they had an all around good time. What a way to wrap up our time here in the east.


*The movie Planes has a song in it where they rap "New York, New York City, Come on." My kids changed to words and sang it over and over the whole trip.