Hard and hopeful truths of being a med wife

If you recall, we originally started this blog so people could get an idea of what it's like to go to med school. We wished there had been more blogs for us to read before starting so we could get an idea of what it's like. Here are some thoughts I've had over these last few months about what it's like at times. I'm hesitant to post this, because if I knew ahead of time what it would be like, it would have been much more frightening for me. But despite it all, there is joy here. Joy and difficulty. And at times, all of these are true.

• Sometimes (especially near big tests) it feels like we're people who just happen to live in the same house as each other. Like you're just roommates but the other one doesn't ever do the dishes.
• But you didn't expect him to be doing the dishes; he's got better things to be doing. It's not the not-doing-dishes that's hard - it's that utter loss of time and closeness that make it hard. You really have to work at your relationship to keep your humor, intimacy, and personality intact.
• But sometimes you can't help but both be living your separate lives and hope they become the same life again someday.
• A professor at James's school says he and his wife got through it by remembering med school is "a short term investment for a long term benefit." I like this, and  tell myself some variation of that at least weekly. "It's not forever." "It's just three more years."  "It'll end someday." "It'll be worth it."
• At times you almost stagger under the thought of how the end isn't the end - after school there's residency, which is its own tangle of poorly paid and overworked years, and then you have to face a student loan which is worth more than the average house. And you realize that this whole "at least you'll be married to a doctor" line people try to sell you is baloney. The first half of becoming and being a doctor is miserable, and "someday you'll have money" doesn't help the "now you don't have any, and your kids don't see their dad, and there's nothing for birthdays" problem. Maybe in twenty years.
• But when your student comes home excited about something they learned, you love it. They try to explain it to you and usually can't because it's obscure and not that interesting to you, but you love, love, love it anyway.
• You know your family and friends will never truly understand what your life is right now; it's not realistic to them. And that's okay. They become desensitized to it, or might be hurt by why you still can't do whatever it is, and it stinks to hurt them. It's hard to communicate the daily weight of this, and that every single test is a very big deal, and when we do have time off, we want to spend it together first. Other things that used to be high on the priority list slip down, and family and friends notice that loss, and it's heartbreaking to contribute to that. I feel very protective of my time with James. We need it.
• Test days (at least for me) are actually wonderful. James gets the day off after his tests, and since he has nothing new to study, I know we get to have family time.
• Sometimes after test weeks, when Henry sees James on Sunday after many days of little to no visual of James, Henry is wary or afraid of James, the tall stranger. I think that's pretty hard on James, and it's hard to know we can't really change it. But as Henry gets older, it's getting better.
• On the other hand, Henry is so young he won't remember this, so it's lucky.
• You can talk for hours to anyone who'll listen about the nuances of medical school and you don't even attend. Your nuances are different from your student's, though. It gets a little old hanging around your student and his school friends - that is ALL THEY TALK ABOUT. You'd think they might for once talk about something else, like sports or video games or the weather, but those topics last for maybe ten seconds.
• However, you yourself have your own topics that are probably ALL YOU TALK ABOUT, and it makes an enormous difference to get some sort of support group for you as a spouse, too. This could be church, other student wives, coworkers, or anything. You need your life to matter, too, and I love that I have friends who are in EXACTLY the same boat as me, and they understand completely. I love it.
• The utter, crushing, financial weight of this is something I will not miss.
• I am so grateful for programs and loans and other things that help us afford to get through this.
• I never cease to be amazed at what James knows and is capable of. Not only the material they're learning (he can diagnose things! It's crazy!) but his capacity for self discipline, his ability to study effectively, his great intellectual effort, his natural skill and joy for the subject. I like to see my husband succeed at things he works hard for. 
• There is something both humbling and strengthening about these years. Knowing we're in this together, following our family's dreams, and working so hard to do this - it's the kind of thing you look back on, I suppose, and say, with great satisfaction, "We did that." For today, there is great pride in saying, "We're doing this now."
• And despite it all, I am happy. I'm with my husband (at least sometimes) and I'm with my son. It's a safe place. There's sunshine and there are friends. There is beauty in our struggle. We are adding strength to our family. All I want is to be with James and Henry, anyway, so why not here? Why not be happy with that now?