Behind The White Coat - Real Talk For Physician Spouses
Being married to medicine comes with challenges—long hours, relocations, and feeling like you’re navigating it all alone. That’s where this podcast comes in.
I’m sharing the things I wish someone had told me—how to survive medical training, juggle parenting, manage finances, and actually build a life you love. We’ll cover everything from making friends in a new city to understanding insurance, finding childcare, and staying connected as a couple.
Some episodes will be just me, sharing real stories and lessons learned. Other times, I’ll bring on expert guests—financial advisors, physician spouses, and those who’ve been through it all—to offer practical advice.
Most of all, this is a place for community. A space where you can feel understood, supported, and even laugh along the way. Because being married to medicine doesn’t mean doing it alone.
So grab a coffee (or wine!), and let’s talk about the real side of life Behind The White Coat.
Behind The White Coat - Real Talk For Physician Spouses
#36| How To Keep The Holidays Joyful When Medicine Disrupts The Schedule
We name the hard parts of being married to medicine during the holidays and trade perfection for a plan that fits real life. From Big Three priorities to warm boundary scripts, we share ways to feel less alone, more present, and more connected.
• expectations versus reality for physician families
• emotional load and invisible work during the season
• loneliness even in full houses
• guilt over frustration and comparison
• Big Three priorities to reduce stress
• celebrate when you can, not when you should
• planned micro-connection with a working spouse
• kind boundary scripts with extended family
• building a micro village for support
• anchor traditions that are simple and repeatable
If the holidays feel more complicated than cozy this year, you are not alone. This episode offers reassurance, practical tools, and a reminder that small, intentional moments still matter.
Please find the PDF with the homework from today’s episode here. It includes simple steps to help you reflect, set boundaries, and create meaningful moments during a busy holiday season.
If you enjoyed this episode, I would love for you to subscribe, leave a review, or share it with others.
DM me on Instagram or email me at amanda@abtnhomes.com with your thoughts, topic ideas, questions, or even guest suggestions.
Hello, my friend, and thank you for joining us on today's episode. I feel like it is really important, this topic, especially where we are at in this season. So this episode is going to basically be all about being married to medicine during the holidays. And I see you, I hear you now. If you just sighed or laughed or roll your eyes, you are in the right place because maybe your spouse is working nights or they are covering Christmas morning or missing a big family gathering again. And maybe you are carrying the weight of making the holidays magical for your kids. Maybe you don't have kids or family close by and you are feeling lonely during the holidays. And maybe you're just staring at your calendar, wondering, how on earth do I juggle travel, work, family expectations, call schedules, and the emotional load of just doing it all over again. So I hear you, and I want to just jump right into this episode as far as being married during the holidays. All right. So let's just start being honest and talking about being married to medicine during the holidays. It's different, it's not like the Hallmark movies. Sometimes you are celebrating the holiday on a different day. Sometimes you are eating Christmas breakfast in the afternoon. And sometimes maybe your family is opening gifts with FaceTime propped up on the counter while your partner is charting in the callroom. And sometimes you are the one smiling through gritted teeth while maybe family member or friends are like, what? Like he's working on Christmas? Why can't he just take off? And it's hard. It's difficult. I have been there. You know, a real quick story for me is I was basically nine months pregnant with our first son. And I remember he was in residency and he was working on Christmas. And was I lonely? Yeah. But there really wasn't much that I could do about it at that time. And so a lot of us are going through this. And this is where we we've got to kind of figure out how to make it work, acknowledge that it's not going to be picture perfect. And many of physician families are feeling the same feeling, and they're just kind of winging it. And so I wanted to break this down where I personally feel like there are four big challenges that physician families face during the holidays. So the first is expectations versus reality. So everyone in your life has this ideal version of what the holidays will look like, whether it's because of how you were brought up with your family, you are a Hallmark, you know, Christmas movie watcher, and these are the expectations you have. Medicine has its own version of expectations, and it does not care about perfectly timed dinners, it does not care about matching pajamas. It is hard to have these expectations versus what it's really like to be married to medicine. I think the second big challenge is just the emotional load. So spouses, many times, like I had mentioned earlier, are taking care of the calendar. So whether that is all the school functions that are happening during the holidays, whether you are the primary parent getting them to and from all the things, you have to do gifts, not only for your family, your extended family. Maybe your kids are doing a gift exchange or their teachers need gifts. You're also keeping the kids' expectations of what their gifts would look like, but also what it's going to look like for your family celebrating. You maybe you're in charge of all the decorating. And on top of that, it's just a stressful season. People rushing, trying to get all the things done financially. It can be super stressful. So you are managing all of these emotional temperatures that people are feeling. And it's a huge job and it's an invisible job. I think the third biggest challenge is loneliness. You know, I just told you guys my story of being nine months pregnant and had a pity party, the woe is me that he was working and I was by myself. And, you know, even if your house is full, it can still feel isolating when your partner maybe is mentally checked out, maybe they are exhausted, or maybe they are physically at the hospital. But there is a sense of loneliness during the holidays because it's a time that you feel like you should be with family. And these are the memories we're supposed to create with family. So it's definitely a big challenge. And then the fourth challenge I feel like is guilt. So you feel guilt for being frustrated. You feel guilt for feeling alone, guilt for wanting the holidays to maybe feel a little bit easier. You're feeling guilty because you're comparing your holidays to what everyone else's looks like. And it's not that you're being dramatic, but you're human. And these feelings are totally normal. Um, but it's like, okay, here are these challenges. So what are the solutions? How do we tackle these and still keep our sanity? So I have some tips that I feel like are helpful that you could implement immediately to help lighten the emotional load during the holidays. So, number one, pick your big three. And what I mean by that is decide on the three things that matter most to your family this season. I don't mean your extended family. I mean your core unit. And maybe that's just you and your spouse, maybe it you have kids, but whatever that core unit looks like, pick your three things that matter most, not what social media tells you matters. So maybe it is, okay, we are gonna have one holiday meal together. Maybe you are gonna look at Christmas lights together, or maybe you are gonna have those matching PJs and watch a holiday movie. Everything else, though, is optional or just icing on the cake. But you're gonna pick your three big things that are gonna matter most. And you can sit down with your whole family and maybe come up with your three bigs together. And so it's kind of setting those expectations up and you work around each other's schedules and you work around, you know, some of these challenges that we just talked about for these big three. The next tip, celebrate when you can. And so, yes, of course, you may have to shift a date, you may have to shift a time, shift a tradition. But at the end of the day, especially if you have kids, they don't care when Santa comes, but they do care if you are totally present, you are creating these memories, and most of all, you are calm. It is not this frazzled frenzy of we have 10 minutes before you have to leave for your call shift. Let's just get through these gifts, let's just open these really quickly. So I think we have to always make sure to keep those things in mind because it is still creating these memories for our kids. And so we want to make sure that we are fully present and just being the best that we can be. The next tip would be plan for connection. So if your spouse is working, figure that out. Bring them a plate of dinner. Maybe again, you schedule 10 minutes of FaceTime and you guys are opening gifts together. Maybe you bring up hot cocoa or their favorite coffee, and you have 10 minutes in the cafeteria together. You have to create that connection. Maybe you guys open gifts and then you save some gifts for later so that you can still create that time together. They feel included, but it's these little moments that matter more than the big stuff and the big performances. Next tip set boundaries with love. And what I mean by that is you don't owe anyone an apology for your family's schedule, your partner's schedule. So here's an example. Hey, with Chris's call schedule, we are doing things a little differently this year. And here's what works for our family, or here's what works best for us. And you say it warmly, kindly, and you repeat it as many times as needed, but you definitely set boundaries around some of these expectations that maybe your family is creating for you. Next tip build a micro village. And I feel like this one is huge. So if your spouse or partner is gone, who else can you look at lights with, have dinner with, let the kids play, join another family for a Christmas movie night. The community makes the holidays feel less heavy. And I know it's not always the most ideal, but you are embracing the situation you are in. So build that micro village. It will make all the difference. The last tip is give yourself permission, permission to keep it simple, permission to let go of certain things. Maybe you're gonna order dinner instead of cooking. Maybe you're just gonna rest, or you kind of laugh at the chaos. Giving yourself grace and giving yourself permission is going to be life-changing for you. So here are the homework or actual steps that I would implement today. I'll also include this PDF in the show notes. But first one, write down your family's big three. So remember that's what actually matters to you and to your spouse or to you and your family. So you guys create your big three. Second, set the boundaries with family if needed. Your future self will definitely thank your present self. So whatever those boundaries look like, make sure you set those. The third one is plan one connection moment with your spouse, even if they are working. Figure out what that's gonna look like. The fourth, pick a fun, simple anchor tradition. It becomes a memory because it's repeated, not because it's fancy. So I will give you a couple examples. So one that we have done for years for Thanksgiving. So keep in mind it doesn't mean that it's actually happening on Thanksgiving Day, but whatever day we are celebrating Thanksgiving, that night as a family, we always would watch National Lampoons Christmas Vacation. It just was a funny movie. And then it kind of set the tone for us to, okay, now we're moving into the Christmas season. And so we have done that for many, many years and we all look forward to it. The second one was a Christmas tradition that we would always do is we would get 25 books. They were Christmas books. We would wrap them and we would put a big number on the front: 25, 24, 23, 22. And every night the boys would choose. We would wrap them and put them under the Christmas tree. And the boys would choose a book, we would read it, get them into the Christmas spirit, and then it also would be so exciting because it was slowly counting down to Christmas Day. So those were two anchor traditions that we did forever. Obviously, now my boys are older and we're not doing the unwrapping of the Christmas books, but we still do our Christmas vacation every Thanksgiving night or the day we celebrate Thanksgiving, we do it that night. So the holidays may not look like the Hallmark movies, but your family's version is just as real and meaningful. And so being married to medicine doesn't make your celebrations less special, it just makes them uniquely yours. So don't forget, you are doing a great job living this medical life and going through this medical journey. You just have to make sure you're giving yourself grace and maybe you're pivoting and doing things just a little bit different. So make sure you guys share this episode with somebody that you feel like may have some connection with the topic that we're discussing. And don't forget, send in any questions you might have or an episode suggestion or title suggestion. I would love to hear from you. And I appreciate you all for listening. Thank you for taking the time. And until next time, that's a wrap on this episode of Behind the White Coat. I hope today's conversation left you feeling more understood and supported. And if you enjoyed this episode, I would love for you to subscribe, leave a review, or share it with another physician spouse. Your support helps more of us to connect. Keep in mind this podcast is for you. So let's keep this conversation going. DM me on Instagram at Amanda Barron Realtor with your thoughts, topic ideas, questions, or even guest suggestions. I would really love to hear from you. Thanks for spending part of your day with me, and remember, you are never in this alone. See you next time.