Behind The White Coat - Real Talk For Physician Spouses

#37| Why Physician Families Thrive When We Stop Waiting For “Later” And Start Building Now

• Amanda • Season 1 • Episode 37

Share episode

In this episode, joined by Katie and Kendra, we share why waiting for “later” rarely works, how coaching gives physician spouses real tools, and where community fills the gaps that anonymous advice cannot. AMA resources, culture change, and practical habits for presence and parenting tie it all together.

• Kendra’s path from survival mode to certified coaching focused on physician spouses
• Katie’s residency story and how small reframes changed daily life
• Why the podcast exists and who it serves
• Coaching boundaries, scope, and value across the med-life journey
• Family systems, burnout spillover, and culture change in medicine
• What AMA offers: magazine, expert calls, retreats, and national reach
• Practical parenting in training years and beyond
• How to connect for office hours, episodes, and coaching
• Two-part wisdom: take ownership and get better so life gets better

For more information, you can visit Kendra’s website and Instagram page, listen to the Supporting Physician Spouses podcast with Katie, and also follow them here to stay connected and engaged with their community.

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.

SPEAKER_00:

Hello everyone and welcome back to Behind the White Coat. I am super excited for today's episode. I have two special guests that I know so many of you already know through their podcast, but I'm going to let them kind of give their own little bit of intro, not only to themselves, their life in medicine, and into their podcast. So please welcome my guest, Kendra and Katie. Thank you so much, Amanda. Thank you guys so much for being here. And before I let you do your intro, I just want to let the guests know that I had the privilege of meeting Kendra first through the American Medical Association and then Katie through Kendra and also through social media. And so I've said this time and time again that I'm just thrilled to have so many connections, not only within the medical community, but it's a love-hate relationship that I have with social media. So thank you guys for being here. Yes, thank you so much.

SPEAKER_02:

And we share that prerogative about social media. It's like a blessing and a curse. And trying to figure out how to use it in the best way for your platform is difficult.

SPEAKER_00:

It is. And I am not one that likes to be like front and center. And now that I have college age and high school kids that follow me, they're always like, mom, don't post that. Mom, that's terrible. And so then I second guess everything that I have like put out there on social media.

SPEAKER_01:

So you're like, you're not, you're not in my audience, kids.

SPEAKER_00:

I know it's like cat hair. So Kendra and Katie, I want you guys to give the listeners a little bit of background of who you are and where you actually are currently in this medlife journey. Excellent. Kendra, you go first.

SPEAKER_01:

Yep.

SPEAKER_02:

We'll do an arm wrestle tongue of work for it. No, like Amanda said, we met through the American Medical Association Alliance, and we've actually met in person. So I have seen her face to face in Nashville a couple of years ago, which is always fun because that's something that Katie and I haven't done yet. We have not met each other face to face. Our friendship and our relationship has really developed over social media and through email and that. So I have friends across all spectrums, ones in real life and then ones that are virtual friends, which is amazing. I came to this community because I really saw a significant need in myself that wasn't being met online. Like you can only do so much through like big group settings or anonymous Facebook posts. There's only so much connection that you can have, and there's only so much help you can receive because really essentially that is crowdsourcing. And so you just like pick and choose what feels good or what sounds good. And I really wanted to create something that was more relationship-based and provided real tools and strategies for people to actually take back to their lives and improve their lives wherever they were, whether that was in medical school or residency or fellowship or even after. And so my big epiphany came when all through those training years, it was like, when is this gonna get better? And everybody online, the crowdsourcing, all said, just wait. Yeah. Just wait. It's gonna get better. Waiting's the hardest part. Oh gosh. Yeah, it's gonna end and then everything's gonna be wonderful. And the problem with that is that most of the people in that group were in the same stage that I was. And so there wasn't anybody ahead of me saying, you might want to tamper those expectations a little bit, because while things change, it doesn't necessarily mean that it gets better. Because what I found is all of these habits I took with me from those survival mode years and that they were long survival mode years. We're talking, you know, medical school, a long residency, a fellowship. And it was really hard to make that transition with all of that baggage with me. And so I really needed help unraveling some of that. So I could go on to live what I thought was my best life for me and my family while my husband was still working long and difficult hours and still doing really demanding, difficult work. And while I also was doing demanding work, I have five children. That presents its own difficulty. Yeah, it's like goodness, there's a lot, a lot going on. But as physician spouses, we are just not given adequate tools or training or mentorship, all of those things that we drastically and desperately need. And so I wanted to kind of step in and see. So I had to develop the skills, I had to learn all of those things for myself. And then I decided the best way to share that is to become a certified coach. And so I have a basic life coach certification. I collect certifications in the sense that in order to create my own framework, there's lots of things that I need. So continuing education and getting more certifications and learning more so that I can help my clients really create a big picture for their life and where they're going and how they are an important part of creating that. That medicine doesn't just happen to us.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, and we're a constant work in progress, right? Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. And Katie, before you give us your little background, Kendra, where are you guys at as a family in this medlife journey?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes. So my husband finished fellowship in 2013. So this makes it our 12th year out of the training years. Yes.

SPEAKER_00:

Right, right. And still finding struggles and challenges and triumphs in this journey, right?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, there is no point at which challenges, trials, and struggles exist. And so we can only just get better at handling them.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, yep. I totally agree. So thank you for sharing. Now, Katie, tell us a little bit of your journey, a background of your family, and where you guys are currently.

SPEAKER_01:

Yes, thank you so much, Amanda. So happy to be here. So my husband is a third-year medical resident. He's in family medicine, and so this is the third and final year of residency. We're currently in Washington state, and we got married actually 12 years ago. So we got married in 2013. So this is hilarious.

SPEAKER_00:

That is awesome.

SPEAKER_01:

Um, this is the first time we've connected that, Kendra. So as long as we've been married, you guys have been out of drinks. Um, but just like every other physician spouse, it seems like I've had my ups and downs in this journey. And we actually went to a medical school that had a really amazing spouse community. And so that was really fun. But we were only in that area for two years because then we moved again for the last two years of rotations in medical school. And then again, we moved for residency. And I loved the community and just having friendship, but I wanted more mentorship. I wanted more wisdom. And so after we matched, I knew I wanted some guidance because I knew residency was going to be hard. And part of the thing, I guess, the hard that I was really nervous about was solo parenting, um, not having my spouse home as much and being in a completely new area that I had actually never visited myself. You know, we moved side unseen essentially in every way. So I was just looking at life coaching and found Kendra in this database of life coaches. And I saw that she was a physician's spouse. And so I did a discovery call with Kendra. And in that one-hour discovery call, she was able to outline the things that matter to me, especially kind of my creative outlets, and really encouraged me to continue in those while we were going through this transition. We made it about a year of residency, and then I was like, I think I actually need to continue this coaching. Yeah. So through more of a partnership, we started coaching on the regular and getting involved in different projects with Kendra. And it's just been lovely and really helpful. And it's been the thing that's helped me the most in my personal life, in training, to really look at my thoughts from an outsider perspective, non-judgmentally, and see if I can think about things differently and adjust just in minor ways to make my life more whole and well and one that I love.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, and I'm sure I have done life coaching personally, and it's like, oh my gosh, if I could afford it, I would have it all the time because I feel like everybody needs it. And I have no doubt that Kendra is amazing, but also the parallelism, right? Where you're both physician spouses and then like what Kendra had talked about earlier, as far as having somebody a little bit ahead of you and that mentorship. And so I'm sure that having those experiences plus all of her wealth of knowledge from life coaching perspective was huge. Like something that I know I would have loved while my husband was in training, and even currently something I could benefit from.

SPEAKER_01:

Definitely. Yep, you're spot on there.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I'm glad you mentioned that because you know, life coaching is kind of an investment of time and money. And that's really one of the reasons why this podcast exists, is because through the conversations that Katie and I were having, lots of things would come up. And I'm like, this really would be good for lots of other people to know. Yeah. And so I was so grateful when, you know, Katie is a remarkable student, she's a remarkable teacher, she's just a remarkable woman. And so when I threw out a crazy idea, like, hey, what do you think about this? Like, maybe let's do this. Let's like take our life coaching and let's make it a little bit more public in a sense. And would you be willing to do that? And I'm so grateful that she said yes, because I think having this, you know, on both ends of the spectrum while she is still in it, and then as we've we've got 12 or 13 years out of it, that the conversations we have are just so applicable to so many people. And it's just a way to deliver information that not everybody can access.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, yes. And you guys are paying it forward, right? Not only what you have experienced, but what is to come, what you have discussed, questions and needs that you see other people are needing. And I do feel that it when you're talking about it being applicable no matter where you are in this journey, but also to those that are, you know, a spouse in the military, where maybe they are the primary parent and dealing with a lot of things and the moves. And so I feel like when you're saying it's applicable, it's it's across so many different platforms.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. Maybe Katie can help me, but I know we have several, probably even more than we know of listeners who aren't actually involved in physician families who are getting so much value from the podcast, including I kind of beta tested our first couple of episodes on a friend that I have as she was getting ready to move for her husband's graduate training. So she was moving across the country. And the things that I was sending her, she's like, oh my goodness, yes, like this is exactly what I need. Right. But I think there's something special about for physician spouses and physician families who are listening to this to hear that these are real things that are happening in real physician families and these are real tools that we've been able to apply rather than often we hear advice and we're like, well, that's not gonna work for my family. Because we not that we're so special or so different, but we feel like there are so many obstacles and challenges that maybe traditional methods won't work for us. And so being able to find a way to say, yes, this is applicable and this is how you can make it applicable.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, no, I totally agree. And that leads me, I've I've got a two-part question. So one, Kendra, for you, as far as from a coaching standpoint, are you finding like you've got all different clients you coach? Is it primarily those that are physician spouses? Where is your coaching for that for people listening?

SPEAKER_02:

So I made a decision really early on that the only people that I would coach are physician spouses. I love that. That there wasn't anybody else that would enter, that would get my energy or my time. And so I've been really protective of that. And it's been magical and remarkable and all of those things because it helps me see specifically what the needs are within physician families without having any clutter from any other source. And so I've been very fortunate to just make that my sole focus and to not, I'm sorry if you're not a physician spouse.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, but that's what this is all about. And it just again comes back to what we were talking about the need. There's a huge need for it. And I love having both of your perspectives, you know, Katie as the one getting coached, and then you being the actual coach. And so, and it can it be a physician spouse at anywhere in their physician journey, whether it's med school to a retired physician.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I've coached the gamut from medical student to a couple of years approaching retirement. So everybody, I mean, there isn't a window of opportunity for coaching, of course, the sooner in your journey. Like Katie's a great example of that.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Her transition to the next part is gonna be so much easier because she's already developed skills and tools that will make that transition easier. Those are things that she'll get to enjoy for the rest of her life. Whereas if those are skills you wait until you're, you know, 50 to develop, then it's a little bit different. Right. The amount of time that you have for that to bless your life and your family's life is a little bit smaller. So I always say sooner is better than later, but start now.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Yeah. Well, off the cuff here, I will have to be reaching out to you because I am the person that's almost 50 and probably could be implementing some of these skills that Katie already knows. So uh I'll have to reach out to you to talk to you about coaching myself personally. So that'd be great. And this is actually for both of you, but I wanted to talk a little bit more about your podcast. One, of course, to give it a plug, but let you guys tell everybody what your podcast is, who it is for, and what they can just expect within your podcast.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, great question. So our podcast is called Supporting Physician Spouses.

SPEAKER_00:

Yep.

SPEAKER_01:

And you know, we are both female spouses of our male physicians. And so that's I think primarily what we speak to the most, but it is applicable to like reverse roles or any type of partnership. And, you know, when I as you were brainstorming the name of it, we were like, well, should we call it supporting physician partners because that's more inclusive? But they were like, are people going to get confused that it's like a work partner? You know, right. Sure. Anyways, we we ended up landing on the spouses. And I think our our overarching goal, Kendra, is really to shift the culture around being a physician spouse. And hopefully there's some upstream work that we can do to change the system. Because I don't know, Kendra and Amanda, you know, being a physician spouse for over a decade is it hard to see that the culture hasn't changed. You know, that there are still the same pain points, that it's still just as hard or even more strenuous, and that there are still the same strains on families. And it can be kind of discouraging. And, you know, I think we see this as an opportunity to shift an individual's mindset that can hopefully have a downstream effect to change the way families see their role in the journey, how they can do it in a better, more well way, and have really strong family relationships through the journey.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I'd love that you touch on that because organizational and system-wide change is something that I am very passionate about. So, like we talked about earlier, Amanda and I connected through the American Medical Association Alliance. And so a lot of the work that I do is with organizations really driving home the point that families matter. And I think we are seeing a shift. And what was interesting is you know, as this has become my life, is that there was a point in time, like 20 years ago, before we started talking about physician burnout, that we were really paying attention to the physicians' relationships, to their marriage, that there were opportunities when you went to conferences for the spouses to have a track for themselves. And that went away. And the shift all of a sudden turned to solely on the physician and their whether they called it resilience or burnout protection prevention, that the shift went there. And we're starting to see, and Katie and I have both been contributing to this literature, we have a paper that is hopefully going to be published this year that is an academic paper that is going to shed light again on physician families. So I think we're starting to see slowly the turn towards large organizations paying attention to that side of the equation because what we saw is we've had this burnout problem and it hasn't changed.

SPEAKER_00:

No.

SPEAKER_02:

So how can we actually make it more holistic? Well, we can include the family and make sure that the family is taken care of. And I'll give a little plug to Dr. Sarah Grimmer. She did her PhD research on that, how perceived physician burnout in the home is transferred to the spouse. And so we have two decades of physicians who are experiencing burnout. And guess what? That trickles down to their family. Their families are under that stress. They feel that, and that impacts them deeply. And so we have a systemic issue that needs to be addressed.

SPEAKER_00:

I agree. And I love that you brought that up. So, first, thank you for your podcast because I think it's fabulous. I love all the topics that you guys discuss, and I think there's a huge need for it. But, you know, having that support for physician families. And obviously, what that looks like is different, whether it's podcasts, whether it is the alliance, whether it's these papers and research. And so thank you guys for doing what you are doing.

SPEAKER_01:

Thank you. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

It's our pleasure. Yes, yes. And I it's just something that I feel like has been needed for so long. And so I'm very, very happy to see things slowly starting to come and more people talk about it, the good and the bad. And so, Kendra, I want you to dive a little bit deeper into what AMAA is. I will admit, not too long ago was the first time I had found out about it, even and didn't even know it existed. So I would love for you to shed some light on what that is for our listeners who maybe don't know, give a little idea of what that looks like, if you want to be a part of it, what that would entail, and then just where they can actually get that information.

SPEAKER_02:

Sure. I would be happy to. So you are not the only one. So I came to the American Medical Association Alliance in 2020, and I stumbled upon it because I was working on another project and looking a little bit deeper. But that's not to say, you know, 15 years ago, I was also looking and I didn't find the same.

SPEAKER_00:

And I think I found about it a year before you, maybe. I mean, yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

So there's certainly some issues that we're trying to address. And this is my second year serving on the board of directors, and we're making great strides towards, first of all, getting our message out through social media and also through a new website that we'll be unveiling probably at the beginning of the year. And with that, some more complicated tracking so we can see how people are finding us, and so we can also show up in SEO searches. So when you Google something that we actually show up, because we know that there are thousands of people, maybe tens of thousands of people Googling, trying to figure out where I can go. To get support, and where can I go to get help? And so my position on the board has been really driving that forward. Like, we have got to do a better job reaching out to the people because times have changed and the structures have changed. And I hear from people who have been in the Alliance a long time that in the past that it was just like included in their husband's membership, or that they were able to find out about it differently because the structure of the system of medicine was different. And so, as that structure has fallen apart and changed, so has the way people find us because they don't just accidentally find us. They have to really be looking for us. And so that's what we're trying to change, is to make that a little bit easier. In the past, one of our focuses also was really contributing to the community. And we do do that, not so much as a national organization anymore, but in our states and counties, there's still a big community outreach component to that. But for the national education, we're really starting to move in the direction of providing excellent education resources and content that is specific for a position family, regardless of where you live, and regardless of whether you have a local alliance. I know you're fortunate to live in an area that does have a state alliance. And I may I don't think Nashville has an active alliance, but there are close counties nearby. In Texas, I'm blessed to live in the land of multiple alliances. There are a lot of opportunities. But I know in places like Washington, where Katie is, there isn't a state alliance and there isn't a local alliance. And so as a national organization, we're starting to rethink how can we provide value to the people who don't have in-person on the ground contacts. And so I think over the next year or two, you'll start to see some really new and innovative things happening within the alliance to make that connection and to be more inclusive of every physician family, whether or not you have a contact with a local or a state alliance. And so let me give a plug then also. You can visit our website right now, but I'm telling you, I'm in the middle of overseeing a whole revamping of that website, and it's gonna be amazing. So you can see a before and after right now if you'd like to go to the AMAAliance.org. That is our old public website. Like I said, that will be transitioning to a new platform.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, and to catch everybody up to speed, because I will tell you, I am slowly growing a local one here. Nothing official yet. But so the AMAA, American Medical Association Alliance, you guys, is a national organization specific for physician spouses. And there's all different avenues of how you can be involved, right? As much as you want, as little as you want from a political standpoint, from a physician family standpoint. Kendra, feel free or Katie, to explain any more about that. But in a nutshell, there's so many people that have no idea when they hear AMAA what that is. And so I just wanted to encompass all of what you were saying.

SPEAKER_02:

Sure. Let me give you maybe an example of some of the things that we offer if you're interested. If the listeners are interested in that, it is the best value for the money you can get anywhere. We have membership levels for retired members, for practicing physicians, for early career physicians, for people who are still in training. So it's incredibly affordable to get involved. And if every member gets a hard copy of, and of course, where did I put my magazine? Um, Physician Family magazine that is published. We publish it three times a year, but it is a magazine dedicated to physician families. That alone is kind of worth the price of membership. In addition to that, we do not every month, but almost every month, we have a virtual call with an expert in their field. So our last two calls, we had um Jenny Shepherd. She is our director of legislation and advocacy, and she did an amazing presentation on how anybody can be involved in the political process, how you can make a difference, whether it's locally, in your state, or nationally, on things that are really important to you. She's the expert in our organization on how to do that and how to get that done. And then last month we heard from Dr. Emily Kent. She's doing research on loneliness, and she was able to use that to apply to physician families and just showed how even loneliness is contagious. And I think we saw, especially during the COVID years, that as soon as those things were taken away and you weren't able to connect with people, that we had loneliness and isolation shoot up. And I don't know that we've actually ever recovered from that when the whole world kind of went virtual.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

It was great. We all thought, well, this is wonderful because now we have access to all of the things. We don't have to go there. But at the same time, we're missing some of that connection component. And so the AMA Alliance also does in-person events. So this last September, we had one in Salt Lake City, Utah that was an in-person three-day meeting, which was amazing. We're rebranding our meetings to call them retreats now because that is really going to be the focus is creating an environment and an opportunity for people to feel rested and restored, not necessarily scheduled and meeting busy. So our next annual meeting is coming up in May. So it'd be the 28th, 29th, 30th, and 31st. And this is going to be in Charlotte, North Carolina. And anybody is welcome to join us at that meeting. So we'll have registration that's going to open up probably early, it'll be probably February. Yeah. And more information about that. But that is again, this is where I met Amanda. I've met so many people at that meeting that have just been not only great contacts, but have become great friends also.

SPEAKER_00:

I agree. And thanks for sharing that. And I feel like it's just a great place for community, for connections. The AMAA can also help you find local people that are looking for connections. And it's a great way for you to get connected and involved. So I feel like our, and I say our medical community is always looking for ways to give back. And so they just kind of need direction. And so I feel like that's a that's a great way to do that too. So thank you. Absolutely. You're welcome. Okay. The other shift that I wanted to ask each of you about was parenting. Because I feel like y'all are in different seasons of life and have, like I said, so much to share, whether it is as they grow, go off to college, you've got experience with that, Kendra, and then Katie, as they are um younger. But I find I get so many questions, both local and just, you know, how do you do it? What tips do you have? How did you decide when to have kids? And how how do you not get burned out yourself? And so I know that's a loaded question. And I know that we could go on and on about that. But if you just have some little nuggets that you feel would be good to share, I think that would really help a lot of our listeners.

SPEAKER_01:

I can go first. So I have three kids and they are eight and younger. So eight, six, and three. And we had our first before my husband started, even his master's before medical school. So we've had kids the whole time through the journey. And I would say none of it has been easy. And when I read posts on the many different physician spouses, wives, Facebook groups, oh yes, who are always asking, when should I do it? When's the best time? It's different for everyone. And honestly, I most of my best friends are not uh medical spouses. And it's hard and inconvenient at any time. And not inconvenient as in it's just gonna be a a crap show no matter when you do it, but it's just a huge life shift.

SPEAKER_00:

And is there ever a perfect time?

SPEAKER_01:

There's never a perfect time. Um it's it's disruptive no matter if you have maternity leave or not. Expensive no matter when. Yeah, yeah. And actually, my my spouse and I jumped because we had all three kids while he was still a student. So we were on Medicaid. So we're like, actually, maybe that was a good time to have kids. Three babies in the hospital, you know. Right, right. But I think the thing that's helped me the most is seeing my children as again, not that inconvenience, but as people who I can connect with and who I can enjoy even when I'm missing my spouse. So while I was working with Kendra and coaching, I realized that I was getting into a rhythm of coming home and wanting to just disengage and be Marko pulling my friends or something. And instead of doing that, I shifted to go do an activity that I love doing with them no matter the day. And that was stopping by a beach on the way home, which sounds so dumb. Like, why wouldn't I do that anyway? Like, of course, the beach. But yeah, go to the beach, watch them explore, let them bring me little trinkets, and then just being really present with them. And I think we do live in a time where it's super easy to disengage and not be present with our children. But the more we are aware of them, we watch them grow and see their curiosity for life, it really does fuel us. And I actually get the opportunity to serve with a lot of kids of ranges 18 months to 11 with my church. And I am starting to see that there's a lot of power in children. And honestly, I think that they they bring us out of our own kind of selfish ways and they ground us. Like when there was this huge, you know, I don't know, every other weekend there's a big mass shooting, right? Or things are going on in the world that are really scary.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

And you go engage with your kids and they have no idea what's going on, and they're so present with like the crunching leaves outside. I think that's a really important lesson for us to learn. So when our it's refreshing. When our spouses are gone and we're solo parenting again, I kind of look at them and kind of glean from their wisdom of just what it means to be human and what it means to just be alive and living and moving from one present moment to the next.

SPEAKER_00:

And the simplicity of it. Like you were saying, stopping by the beach or you know, hearing the crunching of the leaves. I think sometimes life gets so complicated, whether it is all the technology, how busy we are in work, and sometimes just slowing down on the quiet and like you said, being present, that simplicity can go so far.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_00:

So thank you for sharing. I I really think that's great advice. Kendra. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, if only I'd had that advice when I was going through because I I honestly remember it's written in my journal. All I wanted to do during those training years is I just wanted to go to sleep and wake up when it was over. And so I think when you find yourself living in survival mode, it's really hard to find joy in being present because all you're thinking about is how better it's going to be later. Yeah. Instead of creating these magical moments right now, that's not to say that we didn't have magical moments, of course. We did. But if you can keep your focus on the present, on what is happening right now, the future will take care of itself. Like instead of wishing that you were somewhere else, instead of wishing that this was over and you could just get to the good part, I think that's what creates a lot of disillusionment. Is because when you expect it to be really, this is going to be this whole different life, and it's really not that different. Some things are different, some things are better, some things are worse. And now, as my kids are going off to college, I've got two that are out of the house. I have another one who's doing college applications right now, and we're starting to get acceptance letters. I would love to go back to the residency years when there was no pressure. There was no like the decisions weren't as big when life was really simple. And I'm glad that I had my kids during that time because you know, his residency was, you know, residency and fellowship was like seven years. It's like, what would I be doing anyway? We didn't have any money. Right, right.

SPEAKER_00:

It's the same. If I could go back, I would because I remember, you know, those moments where they say, you know, the days are long and the years are short, which is so cliche and so true. But when you're talking about being present in the moment, I think some of those magical moments are in the messy, in the messy stuff. But it is hard to see that in the moment and have that clarity. And so again, kind of talking about finding your tribe, that sometimes those people that are a few years ahead of you, you know, hindsight's 2020, but it's like cliche, but it is so true. I I would love to go back again, Kendra. But you know, like I would.

SPEAKER_02:

I know, and again, it is cliche. And how many times were you told that? Like I was told that. Like just wait, they grow up so yes, and so Katie, feel free to roll your eyes at us. But especially because I think how many do you have you have two or three in college right now out of that?

SPEAKER_00:

Do you have one at home? I have one at home and one in college.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it it does happen so quickly, and especially now when I see like little kids, I'm like, oh, just to like be with little children. My baby's nine.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, like same. It's not the same. Yesterday we had our physician spouse book club, and somebody brought their new baby, and I could not wait to hold the baby and snuggle. And I know as this weirdo smell in the baby, and it was just like, oh my god, it's like if I could have that back, and she's like, please hold her. And it's just so yeah, I think both of those are great advice.

SPEAKER_01:

You guys might be priming for grandparenthood. I think once your grandparents be like, I don't want to go back, 2.0 is way better.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I'm hoping we have some time before that. Yeah, true, true, true, true, true.

SPEAKER_02:

Or you can do it like we did.

SPEAKER_00:

I'll just get a dog and now I have yeah, we we have a couple of those too. So I I think we're at a very nice, very nice spot. Well, I can't thank you guys enough for being here. So if any of the listeners have questions, they want to connect with you, they would like to listen to the podcast. I would love for each of you to just let them know how they can find you.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. So we are on Instagram at supporting physician spouses. We're we're there all the time posting uh clips from our podcast there, and also tips of kind of the the pain points of what it means to be in the thick of this medical life. So we drop new episodes of our podcast called Supporting Physician Spouses every Tuesday. We're in the middle of a series right now called the Predictability Problem Series. And we have some fun things coming up for the holidays. You can email us at hello at physicianspouses.com, and that's where you can send us your individual questions. Um, we also host monthly what we're calling office hours. So where you can come chat with us live, we can talk about the pain points and kind of come to shared solutions. What would you add, Kendra?

SPEAKER_02:

I would just encourage people to come. I know like the first time that you try anything is a little bit scary, but over the last several months, we hope that our listeners have discovered that Katie and I are really just like them. This is not a scary place to be, and that it is really a joy to get to speak with other people. And there it there is something that happens when you share a piece of you with somebody else who's sharing a similar lifestyle. That there is, I'll use the word magic again. Like it really is like something happens to everybody who is in that room. And so we've really enjoyed doing them. We hope to be able to do this on a continuing basis and to just make some of these tools and some of the things that we're learning and we're still learning, available and applicable and accessible to everybody. And then if people wanted to go a little bit farther, if they wanted to actually work with somebody one-on-one, that I am always happy to do that. That is what like feeds my soul. So I hate to say it's all about me, it's not.

SPEAKER_00:

But no, you both enrich, I feel like, so many people's lives because of what you do. And I'm forever grateful just you sharing and being there for people. Your series are great. I will tell you, y'all are far more organized than me. And so I have to take some some notes from you guys. But um, and so Kendra, if they want to do coaching, would they reach out to you in a different setting or through that site?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, they could reach out either way, either through the supporting position spouses, Instagram or email. Kendra it gets better now is my email address. And then on Instagram, I'm Kendra underscore it gets better now. I share things from the podcast as well as other things that are happening in our life or things that I'm thinking about on there. But that's how they would get a hold of me.

SPEAKER_00:

Perfect. And we will, of course, put all of that in the show notes too for people to be able to reach out to you. And I'll always end with two questions for all of my guests. So, first one is what advice would you offer your younger self?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, one second of sure, it would be it's this quote that I have from Joan Rivers, and she she says, Life doesn't get better if you get better. And so that's what I would tell my younger self is that you you just can't wait for it to get better. But when you become better, then life becomes better. And so don't procrastinate that you can do that now in whatever circumstance you are. Yeah, that'd be perfect.

SPEAKER_01:

I think for me, it would, and this is top of mind right now, but though there's a lot of things that are prescribed for you in the medical journey, where you get into medical school, where you match how much money you have or can earn while you're in training, I would say this is still your life, take control of it and like own it. That's probably the advice I'd give. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

That one's good too. They're both good. Yeah, yeah. Great advice. And then my last one is just for fun. If your life were a reality TV show, what would the title be? And you can say whatever, whatever you would like with that one.

unknown:

Oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_02:

I need to watch more reality TV so I have some concept of great, British. Which is one of my favorite shows, might I tell you. You know what? I actually do. This reminds me of my friend. I'll give a plug to Haley Harlock. She's the founder of the Flip Side Life. We were doing an event together like five years ago. Oh, yes, yes. I'm gonna have her on too, by the way. Oh, good. Yeah, she's great, but when we finished it, or we were doing all sorts of crazy things. And in the end, we would always be like, well, we didn't die. So I think that would probably be the name of my reality.

SPEAKER_00:

I I didn't die. Hey, I think, I think that uh speaks very, very much so to the audience as far as what we are all going through, no matter what season of life we're in. So I I think that's a perfect title.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I love that. Katie, do you have one? I have the I don't know. Mine's like adventures out there, but I don't, I don't know. Hey, that's just how I like to live.

SPEAKER_00:

So and and I I think that we can all take notes from that. It's it's just the little things and bringing in that joy. Yeah. Well, thank you guys for being here and just sharing a little bit about you, your life, and um what you are doing for this medical spouse community. And thank you to the listeners today. If this resonated with you, I would love for you to leave a review or send us a comment. Or if you've got an idea for a podcast guest, please send it our way. And then don't forget to tune in to Kendra and Kate. Podcast. That one I think is gonna be huge for you guys if you've not tuned in yet. So thanks again, 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.