Shadow Me Next!

Medicine, Motherhood, And The Art Of Asking For Help | Dr. Kristen Cain, MD

• Ashley Love • Season 1 • Episode 50

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The most powerful moments in medicine often unfold after the diagnosis, in the quiet where plans are made and hope is rebuilt. Join us as we sit down with Dr. Kristen Cain, a physician who is double board certified in OBGYN and reproductive endocrinology and infertility. She traces a winding path from a mismatched residency to a specialty that blends precise science with unmatched patient care. 

We walk through how Dr. Cain leads two clinics while keeping patient education clear and compassionate, from first consults to delivering hard news and reframing the next step. She takes us inside the embryology lab, spotlighting the skilled scientists whose fine motor control and calm focus power modern fertility breakthroughs like preimplantation genetic testing and embryo assessment. 

One powerful moment of this conversation is a simple idea: do only what only you can do, and get help for the rest. Dr. Cain shares how she merged medicine and motherhood by auditing tasks, delegating strategically, and setting boundaries that protect energy for work that matters and family that needs her. She also offers concrete guidance on negotiating job terms early, building supportive teams at home and in clinic, and saying yes with intention.

To learn more about Dr. Cain, connect with her at: 

Website: www.drkristencain.com (Check out her free guide!!)

Instagram: @drkcain

LinkedIn: Kristen Cain MD

Virtual shadowing is an important tool to use when planning your medical career. At Shadow Me Next! we want to provide you with the resources you need to find your role in healthcare and secure your place in medicine.

Check out our pre-health resources. Great for pre-med, pre-PA, pre-nursing, pre-therapy students or anyone else with an upcoming interview!
Mock Interviews: shadowmenext.com/mock-interviews
Personal Statement Review: shadowmenext.com/personal-statement
Free Downloads: shadowmenext.com/free-downloads

Want to be a guest on Shadow Me Next!? Send Ashley Love a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/175073392605879105bc831fc

Ashley :

Hello and welcome to Shadow Me Next, a podcast where I take you into and behind the scenes of the medical world to provide you with a deeper understanding of the human side of medicine. I'm Ashley, a physician assistant, medical editor, clinical preceptor, and the creator of Shadow Me Next. It is my pleasure to introduce you to incredible members of the healthcare field and uncover their unique stories, the joys and challenges they face, and what drives them in their careers. It's access you want and stories you need. Whether you're a pre-health student or simply curious about the healthcare field, I invite you to join me as we take a conversational and personal look into the lives and minds of leaders in medicine. I don't want you to miss a single one of these conversations. So make sure that you subscribe to this podcast, which will automatically notify you when new episodes are dropped. And follow us on Instagram and Facebook at Shadow Me Next, where we will review highlights from this conversation and where I'll give you sneak previews of our upcoming guests. Sometimes the most powerful stories in medicine aren't about the moment someone gets the diagnosis. They're about what happens in the silence that follows. Today's guest, Dr. Kristen Kane, is a double board certified physician in OBGYN and reproductive endocrinology and infertility. She's the author of Doctoring Your Life, a book she wrote because she couldn't find the guide she needed while building her own career, starting a family, and learning to ask for help in a field that rarely slows down. In this episode, we talk about what it means to find your way back when your first career choice isn't the right one. The quiet leadership of showing compassion during someone's hardest moments, and the honest realities of balancing medicine, motherhood, and personal identity. Dr. Kane reminds us that fulfillment in medicine doesn't come from doing it all. It comes from knowing only what you can do and asking for help with the rest. Please keep in mind that the content of this podcast is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only and should not be considered as professional medical advice. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company. This is Shadow Me Next with Dr. Kristen Kane. Dr. Kane, thank you so much for joining us tonight on Shadow Me Next. I am thrilled that you have taken the time to share your expertise with us. Thank you so much.

Dr. Cain:

I'm really excited to be here. Um as I told you before, I think your podcast idea is great. It's such a wonderful resource for people to be able to, you know, listen to somebody who's in a field and kind of get an insider's perspective of what that field is like, what everyday life is like and what you had to do to get there. It's such a great resource.

Ashley :

So I I love that. I appreciate that. You know, it's so interesting. I expected originally for this podcast to be really just, you know, a virtual journal almost. Tell me about a day in your life, describe what you do from the day to day. And what we've ended up talking about really more are the things that make these clinicians tick, which I've realized is almost more valuable than shadowing in clinic. You know, in clinic, as as you understand, things are so busy and we're seeing so many patients, and we are our patients are our focus in clinic as they should be. Um, so oftentimes we don't get to break down these really complicated issues, things that you and I will talk about today, like, you know, how do you how do you discuss fertility with a patient who desperately, desperately, desperately wants to be fertile and unfortunately they're going to get bad news? Or um, you know, how uh what does your life look like outside of medicine? We rarely get to talk about that in a clinic. You know, so the podcast has been such a great avenue to answer some of those extra questions, is what I like to call them. Um, but things that are equally important when trying to identify a career that will work for you and that will fit your life, which, oh my goodness, you are the author of Doctoring Your Life.

Dr. Cain:

The subtitle copy right here so you can see what it looks like.

Ashley :

Absolutely gorgeous. The secret to merging medicine and motherhood while loving your life. So we are definitely going to talk about the extra stuff, as I like to say um today. But thank you so much. So, Dr. Kane, you are double board certified. You're a physician that is double board certified in OBGYN and reproductive endocrinology and infertility. That title is as long as my screen is right now. Let's start from the beginning, if you would. Tell me, have you always wanted, well, did you always want to go into medicine? And did you ever foresee your life looking like what it what it looks like right now?

Dr. Cain:

No, it's been a journey. Um, when I was younger, I kind of thought I might want to do law school or maybe be a scientist, but you know, I didn't really know what those jobs were like. And my father was a college dean, so he was used to career counseling people. And he said, You've never won an argument in your life. Go into medicine. Oh, I did. He said, You'll have a better lifestyle in medicine than working as a scientist in a lab. Um, I it'll be more challenging, you'll like it better. Do that. And he was right, he was a good career counselor in my own house.

Ashley :

Absolutely. That is that's incredible. What a great thing to have as a father. You know, really somebody speaking truth over your life that knows you and knows what makes you tick, I think is is absolutely invaluable. So let's um let's dive into that. When you are double board certified, we talk about that title. What does it what does it mean? Does it mean that you have to go through medicine twice? Do you have to go through medic medical school twice? Do you have to take more exams? What does that look like?

Dr. Cain:

Yes. So what it means is uh actually what I my career path going into reproductive endocrinology was a little wavy too. I started um medical school and did my clinicals, and my first rotation was neurology. And I had this really great resident who was so inspiring, and I and you know, I just loved her and I thought it was such an interesting field. And so I decided that's what I was going to aim for. So I did sub-eyes and research like you do in medical school. And to do neurology, I had to do a couple of years of internal medicine first. So I got my residency in medicine, and the very first night I knew I'd made a terrible mistake. I hated everything about it. And here I was, I was in a job. I was stuck in that job for a year. You know, you I had loans and I didn't have any money, and I had to work my job. So I did, but I started thinking about what I had liked in medical school. And I did like OBGYN a lot, but I couldn't see myself in my 50s getting up in the middle of the night to deliver babies. I just couldn't see that for me. And I thought, well, what do I like? Well, I like small procedures, I like intellectual problems, I like intense relationships with patients, but not forever relationships with patients. And that's an important thing to think about. Some people like a little more distance. Uh, some people like to know their patient for their entire life. Uh, for me, I I liked, you know, having being there at important points in their life and joyful moments of their life uh and knowing them really well. But then I wanted to be able to say, your problem is solved, go and have a good life. And reproductive endocrinology ticked all those boxes. And I knew I liked OBGYN enough to be able to, you know, go through residency just fine. So I got through the year, I went back to where I went from to medical school. I got into their residency program uh with the intention of doing reproductive endocrinology. And so after your residency, which for me was four years, I did three years of or two years of fellowship. Back then it was two. And fellowship is additional education, research, patient care. You also teach residents and medical students, you run clinics, take a little night call just to kind of pay the bills. But um, it it was really fun because you could learn all these in-depth things and you weren't so tired, like not being on call all the time. After two weeks of fellowship, I was like, oh my God, I read something and I remembered it right away. I remembered it the first time I read it. That hasn't happened in years. You have arrived because I was rested. So then you have to take board exams. So you have to take an oral, a written and then an oral exam for both OBGYN and reproductive endocrinology. So it was like um I took a written exam after OBGYN, did my while I was doing my fellowship. Then after my fellowship, I took a written exam in REI. Then I took an oral board exam the, you know, a couple of years later, and then a year after that, I took an oral board exam in REI. So every year or two, I was taking one of these board exams. And that's what double board certified means.

Ashley :

That's amazing. Thank you so much for describing that. There's a couple of things I want to unpack there. First of all, um hilarious, uh just so funny about it's amazing what happens when you're well rested. It really is. And in the fact that you had all the information, but it's um, you know, I've talked to so many physicians specifically. I think uh, you know, every avenue of medicine has those moments, but unfortunately, it seems like physicians have those moments more where uh you're just you're so tired and you've learned so much and people are pushing you so hard. So it's good to hear that there is a light at the end of that tunnel where that knowledge really does stick at some point. Oral exam. So describe that because I don't, you know, that is giving me hives thinking about it.

Dr. Cain:

Yeah, they are they are really hard. Um they they are really hard. And after I took my second one, my husband said, you know, when I was getting ready to go take it, he said, you need to pass this exam because you're not gonna take it again. We're not going through that again. You're either gonna pass it or you're not gonna be board certified. End of story. It's true. That is very easy, very important. They can ask you anything, you know, they can ask you anything they want. So you really do have to read all the textbooks, you have to read a lot of the literature. I tried to figure out who my examiners might be, and I narrowed it down to about a quarter of them because I knew who the examiners are, you just don't know who you're gonna get. Then I read all of their papers because you never know, they might ask on that.

Ashley :

So Dr. Kane and I did not get to discuss a quality question, but something she mentioned would make a very stressful interview question. Imagine sitting in one of the most stressful moments of your life, and your interviewer says, Go through every paper you've cited and tell me why it matters. That happened to Dr. Kristen Kane. This isn't about memorizing data, it's about knowing your why. Be ready to talk about what you learned and how it changed you. Listen to what Dr. Kristen Kane had to say. Keep in mind that there's more interview prep, such as mock interviews and personal statement review, over on ShadowmeNext.com. There you'll find amazing resources to help you as you prepare to answer your own quality questions.

Dr. Cain:

You could get asked about one of your research papers. They might say, I one actually said this to me. I want you to go through your bibliography paper by paper and tell me how it supports your work or why you included it and um what the point of the paper was. And I was like, Oh, geez, I was told that you weren't gonna do that, but okay. So I started going through the list one by one. And after about three, she's like, Okay, she actually read the papers. Yeah, good. We'll move on. But they could ask you anything like, what color is this dose of this medication? Or draw me the chemical structure of estradiol, you know. So you do have to know crazy stuff. And I'm not saying that you'll fail on those kinds of questions. A big part of it is they really want to make sure you know something and that you're not dangerous, but part of it is kind of hazing, you know, they'll just keep going till you're till you fail. They'll ask you questions until you get something wrong, or you say, I don't know. I guess the patient's gonna die because I don't know what to do. I did everything I can think of. I'll call, you know, I'll call, you know, somebody for help. They're like, there's no one to help. Okay, I I'm exhausted my knowledge, you know, and you get on the plane going back and you order a drink, and the back of the plane is full of people drinking, and the front of the plane is full of the examiners because you all go to the same place. Sure, naturally. But it it isn't fun uh taking those exams. It really isn't. The written exams are better because they're mostly multiple choice, and we're trained in how to take those kinds of tests. But uh, you do have to realize that it is it is kind of hazing. And uh those kinds of questions, yeah, it's good to know them, but they're not gonna fail you on that.

Ashley :

No, that's great. And I am so grateful for you describing that because even in medicine as a PA, we did not have to take oral board exams formally. Um, you know, on rotation, and I'm sure you could speak this too, but on rotation, uh, we we call it pimping, right? Where the our our supervising clinician, whether it's a physician or a PA, uh will ask us these questions, put us on the spot and see if we can answer them. And and like you said, it really is a sort of hazing. Our hazing is not graded, unlike yours, but it is a sort of hazing where you it it puts pressure on you to think under pressure, which uh I'm sure in your job you have to do a lot. So it is, it's it's it's almost like a training element to um, thank you for describing that. You know, it's it's so interesting. I was just speaking with somebody the other day about how to differentiate on social media of all places what is uh good information and what is not good information. And part of that was listen to who is giving the information and see if you investigate that person, much like you did with your examiners, investigate that person, find out where their information is coming from, how they filter through what is right and what is wrong, and then see if that's information that you actually want to put in your pocket and take home with you. So um, it's all very interesting. I'm I'm just I'm so grateful that you've you've shined a little bit of light on some of the background of that.

Dr. Cain:

That seems mean, but one, and you know this too, when you're practicing medicine, your patients and their families will do that for you. Oh, yeah. They're going to ask you hard questions, they're going to ask you why you didn't do this, or what's wrong with that, or I read that everybody should be taking progesterone all the time, or everyone knows vitamin B6 um prevents miscarriages, and why didn't you put me on that? And you have to be ready to answer. Well, no, everybody doesn't know vitamin B6 prevents miscarriages because that's actually not accurate information. Right, exactly. But you have to do it and keep your cool and remain calm and somewhat authoritative, you know, like you sound like you know what you're talking about, but kind. And pimping does kind of prepare you for that.

Ashley :

No, I absolutely agree. And I'm so again, I'm so glad you mentioned that because you're right, it's something that as students, you get very accustomed to being pimped by people who know far more than you do. And then you approach clinic, and like you said, you are almost pimped on the opposite end of the spectrum, and you do have to have a rather authoritative tone sometimes, but still be compassionate with the information that you're providing and still be educational about it. You know, you can't be patronizing. No, um, it's just it's not that's not gonna work, as you know. As you know, I was speaking to the choir. So tell us about these stories, Dr. King. I would love to hear about it. A day in your life, um, you work with people in in their happiest moments, and you work with people a lot of times in their most challenging moments.

Dr. Cain:

Um a typical day in my life. Uh, I I have a hybrid schedule. Uh, sometimes I work remotely and sometimes I work in the clinic, and sometimes I see virtual patients when I'm in the clinic. So my I have a pretty busy life right now. In fact, you know, at my age, I'm working harder than I ever have. So I need to take a little of my own advice. But um, it's just kind of how things shaped up at the moment. So I actually cover, I'm the medical director of two clinics, one in Atlanta and one in Charlotte. I'm the only doctor for each, and I travel back and forth between the two clinics. And I have APPs who also see new patients and see follow-up visits and teach patients about uh things that they need to know about their fertility treatment and their medications, and they're really well trained and really good. And um, so I might see new patients for an hour-long consult, and they could be anywhere in the southeastern United States. I have licenses all over the place. And um, I might see somebody else for a follow-up visit to explain her test results and go over her treatment plan. And I have some slide decks, which are really a handy tool. Um, ours are provided by the company I work for, Kind Body, but uh you can make your own too if you want to. It's very helpful. I also videotaped a talk I did, uh, an IVF talk I did on Zoom and put it on YouTube. And I can just send the link to my patients if I don't have time to go through that. So that's a handy tool. So I do a lot of talking, a lot of consults. And then um on weeks that I have procedures, IVF procedures, we do those in our office. We have a small operating room uh with where we provide anesthesia. We have an IVF embryology lab right next to the OR. So I can um aspirate eggs that and fill these little test tubes with fluid that have the eggs in them, and they can just pass it through a window, just a few feet, you know, a foot or two behind me through a little window into the lab. And the embryologist can take it and look at it and do their job making embryos. So it's infertility is very complicated. There's lots of things that cause infertility, lots of things that cause miscarriages. And so um, people usually come to me with a lot of fear. They've put off going to see a doctor for quite a while, a lot of them. And so, my first meeting with them, my job is to educate them and reassure them and make them feel a little more empowered and make them feel like this is possible. And then um at follow-up visits, if things aren't going well, my job is to, you know, help them see the light at the end of the tunnel, help them see that we have other options, go through things that can be improved now that we know more about them. And um and also sometimes to give them bad news. And one of the things I've learned is once the bad news is out, a lot else is not heard. So in our practice, if a pregnancy test is negative or something like that, I usually have the nurses give that initial information. Um, they also get to give the good news right away. And then what I do is I either set up a visit, you know, in the next day or so, or I call them. And um, after they've had a little time to process, you know, not not more than a couple of days and go into more, okay. You know, we were, I was disappointed too. Um, I I was really sad for you. I wish that this had been better, but I I all is not lost. We we still have a lot of things that we can do. Here are some things I noticed in your cycle. We still have embryos, these are some things we can try, these are some things that um might work better for you in the next time. And um, I remind them of the typical pregnancy rates, which are about 70% per embryo transfer. So that that is a typical day, but also, you know, just before I logged on, a patient called me on my cell phone and wanted to know something. I did have a meeting tonight before this with our whole team. So, you know, some of that does bleed into your life. Um, and you as a medical director, you have to manage a clinic, you have to manage personnel. And so learning leadership and personnel management is interesting, but it's another job.

Ashley :

I am so grateful that you described how as a physician, as a clinician, your hat can change depending on where the patient is in their treatment, right? And this is hugely important, especially in OBGYN REI. You know, you mentioned you have an education reassurance hat, and that's your that's your doctor hat, or you have an investigative director hat where you say, okay, this is the information we have. This is the the direction we're gonna go with it. Um, you have a bad news hat, you have a good news hat. You know, it's it's there are so many elements as a physician that I think people just look at you and say, Well, she's a doctor. Okay, yes, but uh what kind of doctor is she for this patient right now? You know, and that's uh the breadth of that is just absolutely huge. Can we back up one second and talk about an embryologist? Now, this person is this a is this a scientist? Is this a physician as well?

Dr. Cain:

Okay, they're scientists usually. Uh some physicians are also embryologists, but usually they're a scientist and they have their own career path. Uh usually they're um PhDs. Uh, some younger embryologists earlier in training might not be a PhD yet, but if they want to, you know, be at the real top of their game, both um in terms of compensation and respect and what they're allowed to do in the lab, they really need to have a PhD. And it takes about five years to fully train an embryologist. It's not a fast process, and most of that training is on the job. Uh, you can take coursework and you do have to take some coursework, but it's not like you go to school with an embryology major, but you know, you get your master's in embryology, you can or lab science or microbiology or something like that, genetics. And uh they have to work with very, very tiny um things. So a good embryologist is somebody who's very calm, who's able to focus, uh kind of hyper focus, who has good fine motor skills. So we find video gamers, uh, if that's their hobby, tend to be good embryologists.

Ashley :

I love that so much. That is absolutely incredible because they're taking, they're taking eggs and they're taking sperm and they're combining them. Is that is that one of their many? Right.

Dr. Cain:

And it's very tiny. These are all microscopic. So they're working under a microscope, and um, the equipment is very high tech. It's it's exciting, you know. You're right there when an embryo is placed in a uterus, and you get to see the patient, you know, possibly get pregnant right at that moment. So all of it's really cool. And the science is exploding. You know, we can test embryos for genetic disease, we can test them to see if the egg fertilized normally and has normal chromosomes. We can tell if it's a boy or a girl, and that's only going to get better. So it's it's a it's a really good field for people who like that kind of work.

Ashley :

Absolutely. And then, and then maybe somebody who is really scientifically minded, fine motor skill-minded, but perhaps doesn't love the the patient care element of medicine.

Dr. Cain:

Right. You know, there's a probably a little bit of communication between the embryologist and the patient, but not nearly as much as, you know, with the doctor. Like usually if it's really bad news, they'll tell me and I'll kind of break it to the patient first uh before they send the formal communication or the written communication about what went wrong.

Ashley :

Very cool. It's an element of the medical team that we haven't been able to dive into before on Shadow Me Next. So I really, I really appreciate you talking about that. Let's get to really the the biggest, most incredible reason why I invited you on the show today. And that is what you have done with this amazing career that you have, is just part of your story. The other part is the fact that you have children and you are a mother, and there is this whole other element of yourself, of your life that is equally as important and at times battles with who you are as a physician. You have a book called Doctoring Your Life: The Secret to Merging Medicine and Motherhood While Loving Your Life. And uh, and this book is an incredible resource for a lot of people. Tell me why did you feel this book was important? Why was why did you have to write it?

Dr. Cain:

Because I wanted to read it. And I wanted a guidebook. I wanted somebody to help me figure out how to do this. You know, I took all those board exams over the course of about three to four years. And during that time, I moved cross-country, I got married, we bought our first house, I had three kids. I was pregnant during two of my board exams and studying for those. And it was just like a crazy time when I started a practice. You know, I I it was just a crazy, you know, four years or so of my life. And I I'm the oldest daughter, you know, that's Taylor Swift's oldest daughter, yeah, that I am. And my my sisters are identical twins who are two years younger than me. So I thought my mom might be helpful because she had three kids under three in her house. So I called her up and I said, Mom, how did you do it? You know, you've got you had all these little kids. How did you manage? And she said, Oh, honey, I don't remember. I was so tired. Least helpful advice I ever got from my mother. So I started asking other women doctors. And it turns out women doctors are amazing at time management. They are some of the most efficient people on earth, and they're great at doing things like delegating, getting help, you know, the the ones that are doing it right, you know, some haven't quite gotten there yet. They're the ones that are floundering and it's the they need to find their mentors who show them how to do that. And the book is there for that. Yeah, if you don't have a mentor handy, it's very cheap. It's a cheap and and easy way to do it, probably take you three hours to read it. So it's not a it's not a big commitment in in money or time, uh, which is a nice thing about a book. You know, it's you don't have to go to a course, you don't have to give up a weekend of your time. But I started asking them, you know, how did you do it? How do you hire a nanny? How do you um get help at home? And my husband was a stay-at-home dad. And I had to ask people, how did that work for you? You know, you hear these, see these movies and hear these stories, and the stay-at-home dad always turns into a schmuck who's having an affair with a next door neighbor and and it works out terrible for you. And that's just a bad story, you know, it's not even a stereotype that has any basis, in fact. Um, stay-at-home dads are amazing, you know. If you've got a partner who wants to do that or a stay-at-home partner at all, that is really helpful. But if you don't, you know, you need to hire help or get help from somewhere else. You cannot do it all yourself. You just can't. You need to get help. And so the second chapter in my book really focuses on uh, if nothing else, read that chapter because it's how to get help, how to recognize what you need help with and how to get help. So if I can leave one like a one-sentence takeaway, it would be, you know, look at your life as a whole and look at the things you like to do or that only you can do. Well, you have to do those things. Make sure you do the things you like to do and make sure and you have to do the things that only you can do. And then look at the things that you don't like to do, but you have only you can do. Try to figure you have to do those two, but try to see if there's a way to take away some of the pain. And then look at the things that you don't like to do, and you don't have to do, somebody else can do. Do it. All of that should be done by somebody else. If you hate it and you're not even good at it and you don't want to do it, why are you wasting your time? I hate cooking. I'll do anything to get out of it. I do the bare minimum. Like sometimes I cook and I know how to cook, but it's not it's not good, you know. It's my children said, you know, mom, you know how they say my grandma cooks with love. You cook with hate. And it shows. But we all have those things, right? I'll fold laundry all weekend. I don't care about that because I put TV on and I watch whatever. And, you know, it's not a hard, it's not a messy job. It's not, you know, it's not bad. I don't mind it. It's kind of meditative. And some people say that about cooking, you know, and there are people who like the things that you hate and they're willing to do that. Find, find that, you know, find what the other people in your life can help you with. And then anything that nobody likes to do, that's what you pay for.

Ashley :

That's that is just my favorite advice. And I am so glad you mentioned your husband because I think that our our life partners, our spouses are so important, especially when we are career women. You know, maybe that career is going to change depending on where you are at in your life. But spouses are so important. And if you don't have a spouse, um, like you said, you've got to find that help somewhere else. So I'm I'm really, really grateful for chapter two of your book. Incredible. Um, there are so many good things in that book that you mention, uh, like things like I'm sure you've heard this before. I don't want strangers raising my my kids. I don't want strangers raising my children. But these are questions that you don't always realize when you're first starting your career. I want to be a doctor and I want to be a mom. I want to be a PA and I want to be a mom. Okay, but what will that look like specifically? And your book answers a lot of those questions before we realize they're even questions, right?

Dr. Cain:

Oh, thank you. That's really nice of you to say.

Ashley :

It's very, very good. Um, things like negotiating time, negotiating for time with your job. I mean, these are these are hard things that unless somebody kind of walks you through it or gives you good advice, maybe you don't even know who to turn for. Before we wrap up, what would be your advice specifically for women who are interested in a career in medicine generally? What would you tell them? What hope would you give them? Oh, absolutely do it.

Dr. Cain:

It it is a wonderful life and it's a wonderful career. And we need you. We we need you so much. There is actual true job security in medicine because there aren't enough of us. And it's one of my friends said, you know, one thing I never have to worry about, one thing we never have to worry about is what is our purpose in life. It's kind of there, it's kind of just a given. It's right there in front of us. We're doing it, you know. Uh, we know what the meaning of our life is. You you are fulfilled by that. And that's an amazing thing. Um, but what you don't want is you don't want it to take over your life to such an extent that you're burned out, that you can't enjoy your family, hobbies, downtime. You know, you need to be able to enjoy all those other things to be a whole person. And it's very easy because people go into medicine tend to be givers and they tend to be people pleasers. And it's very easy for you to fall into this trap of saying yes because you don't want to say no. And um, and then you get to the point where you can't say yes to anything, especially not yourself. So you you do have to figure out some boundaries. Uh, that doesn't mean say no to everything, you know, nobody wants that either. But um say yes to the things that are truly important and keep in mind what is your trade-off because you're going to be trading something off. You know, if you're saying yes to something at work or a great opportunity, you're taking time away from your kids. Is it worth it to do that? It might be for the one hour, it might not be for that one hour every week, you know. Um if you're saying yes to being on a committee, uh you might be you might be saying no to seeing a patient who needs your help because you're not gonna have the time to do both of those things. And maybe the committee is really important and it's about something you care about. But if it's just something that you're gonna put on your resume, you're gonna get plenty of stuff on your resume. You don't have to really look for those things. There's focus on the things that mean something to you, and those will go on your resume.

Ashley :

That's incredible advice, Dr. Kane. Thank you so much for taking the time to join us tonight and for giving us such incredible education, not only in OBGYN and REI, but also just hope, a hope in the fact that you know we can pursue these incredible careers and do so with help from you and from other mentors who have done this before us. So thank you so much for taking the time. Thank you for inviting me, Ashley.

Dr. Cain:

I loved our conversation. It was so much fun. And I actually just to put in a tiny plug, so my website is www.dr Kristen Care I-S-T-E-N, Kane C A I N dot com. And I'm um I've created a little, like very short ebook on negotiating called doctoring your job. Fabulous. And um sign up for my email list. You will get it sometime in the next week for free, just uh as a thank you for signing up. So I just wanted to let people know that you know, negotiating is such an important part of getting the life you want and doing it at the beginning is really important because once you've negotiated your job, it's really hard to make changes after that. You already said yes to these terms. They're probably not going to change them for you. So um I wrote that just as a little free gift for anyone who wants it, and all all you have to do is just sign up. Absolutely.

Ashley :

What that is an incredible resource for all of us, really. Our new clinicians, students, prospective professionals. Um, absolutely, I will link that in the show notes below. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for creating that. That is uh that's something that you don't really realize you need until you need it. So now everybody knows we need it. Dr. Kristen Kane, thank you so very much.

Dr. Cain:

Thank you very much, Ashley.

Ashley :

Thank you so very much for listening to this episode of Shadow Me Next. If you liked this episode or if you think it could be useful for a friend, please subscribe and invite them to join us next Monday. As always, if you have any questions, let me know on Facebook or Instagram. Access you want, stories you need, you're always invited to Shadow Me Next.

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Ashley Love

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