New Year's 2014

1.  What did you do in 2013 that you'd never done before?

Became a nurse!  And pelvic exams.  Lots and lots of pelvics.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?  

I had to look back and here's the rundown:

1.  Keep running -- sort of, I did for several months, and then took several months off, and now I'm trying to start up again.

2.  Keep doing well in school -- yes, in so much as I'm passing and happy and learning as much as I can.

3.  Pass the NCLEX/become an RN -- yes!  Currently applying for summer camp nurse jobs with my fancy new license.

4.  "…move from loathing to loving your own skin." -- a never-ending process, but this is the first year I can remember where I spent more time appreciating my body and its capabilities than I spent wishing it were different and hurting myself to change it.  So that's pretty huge.

For this coming year, I strive to:

1.  Be consistent with fitness.

2.  Nurture the relationships and friendships I am blessed with - stop being lazy about Skype, phone calls, and emails to the people I care about.

3.  Less screen time.  Books are awesome, even my textbooks.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

No, but someone very dear to me is due in April.

4. Did anyone close to you die?

No, and I'm very grateful for that.

5. What countries did you visit?

Nada.

6. What would you like to have in 2014 that you lacked in 2013?

A better balance between school and life - a lot of times this past year, I felt like I was either burning the candle on both ends, or slacking so utterly that it made my stomach clench.  I'm not sure either was true, but if I am consistently more balanced, then if helps me not feel like a swinging pendulum all the time.

7. What dates from 2013 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

August 20th - took (and passed) the NCLEX

November 9th - my boy moved away

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

Becoming a nurse.  Being halfway done with grad school.  Sticking through the shitty times and finding that on the other side of those times, is the best/safest/most loving relationship I could have ever imagined.

9. What was your biggest failure?

I tried very hard to find an RN job after I got my license and didn't.  That still stings.  I also left many a patient visit this fall feeling like I had failed them, that I couldn't do nearly enough.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

Definitely sore after the half-marathon in April, my first ever UTI in July, and some fun GI stuff this fall that is now greatly improved.

11. What was the best thing you bought?

The solid beginning of a professional wardrobe. 

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?

The boy's (again), my parents' (always), and - perhaps most importantly - H. and I worked really freaking hard on our friendship and it shows.  And that makes me happy.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

I had some, um, interesting patients this fall.  I whipped out my very-serious-very-calm-but-very-intimidating clinician voice to good effect a few times.

14. Where did most of your money go?

Yale.  Always and forever.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

Finishing my GEPN year, becoming a nurse, feeling like a real midwife, planning a future with the one I love.

16. What song will always remind you of 2013?

"Half Acre" by Hem.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you: a) happier or sadder?

Happier.  Onward and upward.

b) thinner or fatter?

Maybe a little thinner?  I don't really know.

c) richer or poorer?

Poorer.  Those emails from FedLoan Servicing are like punches to the gut.

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?

Listening.  Sitting still.  Reading.  Running very fast.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?

Overthinking.  Being defensive.  Feeling angry.  Facebook.

20. How did you spend Christmas?

With Richard's family in Ohio.  It was really hard being away from my family.

21. Did you fall in love in 2013?

Every single day, over and over again.

22. What was your favorite TV program?

I liked watching New Girl with the boy, and H. and I liked watching NY Med on Hulu during dinner.

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?

I don't hate anyone.  I hope that nobody hates me.

24. What was the best book you read?

I'm really enjoying The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker.

25. What was your greatest musical discovery?

Hem, but mostly I listened to podcasts during my drives.  I fell in love with This American Life, Radiolab, The TED Radio Hour, and The Moth.

26. What did you want and get?

A relationship that lasts through the tough times, another year to grow and develop, and some truly amazing friendships that I didn't have before.

27. What did you want and not get?

A baby.

28. What was your favorite film of this year?

The boy and I watched "We're the Millers" the other day and it was, by far, the funniest thing I have seen in a very long time.

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?

I turned 25, and felt suddenly very, very old.  I had a test that day, and two more that week, but in between a very stressful school workload, Richard and I went out for dinner and saw a monster truck show.

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

Again, easing this loan stress would be nice.

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2013?

Adulthood!  I wear dresses and slacks and flats and blouses to clinical now, and jeans and scarves and sweaters to school.  And plenty of old scrubs and stolen boyfriend t-shirts the rest of the time.

32. What kept you sane?

Richard.  My parents.  Hallie.  My garden.   Cooking.  Sleep.

33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?

Pope Francis, without question.  He is a leader and a revolutionary, and I admire him.

34. What political issue stirred you the most?

Healthcare, again.  I am extremely disappointed in how the ACA is going so far.  I lost count of the number of patients I saw this year who attempted, and failed, to get healthcare for themselves and their families and were left with no good options.

35. Who did you miss?

I missed Richard so, so much when he moved (it's nice being here with him on break, but that is ending soon).  I miss my parents, always, and especially this Christmas.

36. Who was the best new person you met?

I have two amazing school friends that I only knew peripherally last year.

37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2013.

You don't have to have all of the answers.  You just have to be willing to listen to the stories.

38. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.

All my life is arm in arm with you
When you've got trouble I've got trouble, too.

Long post!  Congrats if you got through it all!

Here's to a happy, healthy 2014 for us all!

New Year's 2013
New Year's 2012

A Year in Pictures

Sitting here, reflecting on 2013, the first thing I thought of was…nothing.  What happened this year?  I mean, seriously?  I tried to think back through the months, waiting for the re-rememberance of some awful tragedy or gut-wrenching sadness and for the first year in a very long time, couldn't remember a single thing.  Sometimes boring is good.  Sometimes boring gives us the space for all the tiny, infinitesimal ways that we grow into the calmer, brighter, and more whole version of who we can actually be.

January and February

I ran my first 5k - sub-30 minutes and I was quite proud.

Superstorm Nemo dropped three feet of snow and CT failed utterly on the clean-up, but we had a ball sledding and trying to stay warm.

March

The first hints of spring.

April

Post half-marathon.

May

Memorial Day weekend hiking trip - it snowed!

June

Planted and grew my first adult garden.  It was a ton of work, but the fresh vegetables and shelf full of canned tomatoes were definitely worth it.

July

Cherry picking

Happy dog

August

Wildlife…in suburbia.

A wonderful visit home at my parents' house on the lake.

September

I made a lot of pie this year.

October, November, December

The new view.

I hate moving.

Thanksgiving homework help.

The love of my life.

2012 Wrap Up

2011 Wrap Up

Taking Part

Decorating for holidays is one of those things that - like cooking my own food and taking cough medicine voluntarily - always makes me feel like I'm play-acting at being an adult.

And then I remind myself that being an adult, like being a midwife, is a whole lot of acting like something you don't quite feel is legitimate until some day you wake up and realize you don't remember ever being anything else.

Tomorrow is my last day at my clinical site.  I will miss everyone there, but especially my patients.  My mind reels when I think about all the women that I will care for in this lifetime and how even the dozens from the last few months will fade into the background of my memories so soon.  The human heart cannot hold them all.  At least, not with faces and names intact.

As I battle through finals and not feeling well and the penetrating cold that has dropped over New Haven, bringing snow and ice and slate gray days, I am reminded to be grateful for warm slippers, Skype calls with Richard, and cats that while they may have a personal vendetta against the Christmas tree, are still very effective foot warmers.  The end of the year always brings with it a bit of panic (for me, at least), as I grasp to hold on to what seems to be flying by, struggling to keep pace with time's inevitable march.  My school friends and I sit in the warm car in my school's icy parking lot before going inside for a truly punishing exam.  We take deep breaths and tell each other, "The time will pass anyway.  All we have to do is go in there, and be a part of it."

Cheers, to being a part of it.

The Cold Has Come

I avoid walking down my street now, in the direction that I paced a well-worn path into over the past year and change.  When I walk past his old place and reflexively look up to see if the lights are on, my breath catches in my throat.  The windows are dark.  No one lives there now.

I lay here in my bed that has barely been slept in for a year and even with a cat at my feet, it feels too big and too cold.  I stay up too late, avoiding the nightly challenge of falling asleep without his solid warmth at my back.  I wait until the last possible second, until I've already guaranteed I'll be exhausted for school in the morning before I turn out the light and curl around my still cramping belly, my uterus apparently deciding to take several months to acclimate to my new IUD.

I don't want to wish away my time here at school.  I don't want to, and yet I find myself doing just that. I see him on some weekends, and for a blissful three packed days of Thanksgiving, and it's wonderful and reassuring and always, always too short.

I want to be there, in his bed, with the sunrise pouring through the windows over the buildings of a city that is starting to, maybe, feel like home.

I tell myself, here is good, too,  and, here is where you need to be, and several times, there are worse things in life than a long-distance relationship.

My toes curl as another cramp rips through me, and all I want is his hand there, holding me in.

I miss him.

Edit: Yeah, not pregnant.

Whole30 Update

I wrote this a few weeks ago:

"I'm on Day 10.  It's interesting.  I think I went into this whole thing with simultaneous beliefs of, "This will fix EVERYTHING," and "It is impossible for diet changes like these to fix ANYTHING."  I am so far wrong on both counts.  My favorite things so far, in no particular order:

1.  My food is delicious.  It's tasty, and I feel good eating it because I know how wholesome it is.
2.  I am not hungry in between meals.  This is huge for me.  I used to get so cranky and hungry in between meals during my epically long school days that I would often develop migraines and/or resort to eating crackers or trail mix or whatever I could find in the vending machine.  Now, I make it to my next meal, with maybe a small snack (packed and planned) if it's a really crazy day.
3.  I get hungry before meals, but not "hangry."  I am not the first person to discover this while eating Whole30/paleo, and I'm sure I won't be the last.  It's a very liberating feeling, to not ever feel like If I don't find a food item to put in my mouth this very instant I will either melt into tears or just DIE OF STARVATION."

So!  All of those things were true and awesome and I felt a lot better for the two-ish weeks that I made it without messing up on the Whole30.  Then the fact that my other half moved to a different city and we spent two frantic weeks finding an apartment in said city, packing up all his stuff, and moving him to said city - yeah, I got a little distracted and found it impossible to pack and eat paleo/Whole30 food all the time.  While I was doing it, though, I noticed improvements in my skin, my GI system, and I lost about 6 pounds.  But over the last few months I've been feeling more and more run down, and that didn't improve, even as everything else did.  I chalked it up to me not lasting the whole 30 days.  Until it got worse.  And worse.  And then I went to donate blood and got turned away for the second time in six months because my hemoglobin was too low.

A doctor's appointment and several vials of blood later, there appears to be something wrong - which is both a relief to not think I'm making up how crappy I feel, but also anxiety-provoking in that I'd really like to know what it is, please, so I can do something about it.  Some of my key vitamin levels were quite low, as was my hemoglobin, hematocrit, and most especially iron (after some serious meat-chowing, no less).  For the next couple of weeks, I'm under doctor's orders to eat as much gluten as I can stand, because she wants to see if I have celiac disease, and that's only accurate if you've been eating gluten for at least three weeks.  Even after I stopped attempting the Whole30, I was still eating substantially less gluten than I had before, and the difference now is marked.  My face is breaking out, my chronic skin stuff has flared up and is the worst it's ever been, I'm nauseas and bloated pretty much 24/7, and I seem to have misplaced my waist.

As much as I love baking and all things flour, I can't wait to be given the all-clear to go back to no gluten (even if I don't have celiac).  And then maybe I'll give this Whole30 thing another shot.

What I Know Now

My patients, they do not leave me.  We exist now as a group, I feel them stringing along behind me when I walk to class or to my car, they hover over my head when I lay down and try to sleep.  Their voices echo in small phrases, glimpses swim in front of my tightly shut eyes while I rub the now permanent line that is etched between my eyebrows.  I struggle to recall faces, instead my mind is filled with a collage of body parts that I try to piece together - clenched hands on the exam table, the paper crinkling under their white knuckles, pale inner thighs that shrink away from my touch, chapped lips that answer my questions in whispers, eyes that won't meet mine.

Sometimes my patients are like the horses I grew up drawn to.  They size me up as I walk into the tiny exam room, the whites of their eyes following my every move.  I sit and lean back against the wall - I have no agenda, I want them to know.  I have tamed the single-minded eagerness to explain, to educate, to inform, to counsel that often fills us as we learn.  I know so little, it seems, I have been trusted with so much, I want to impart every speck of what I can offer, because even that is not enough.  Instead, I sit down and say hello.  I smile.  I ask how they are, and what brings them to me.  I set my pen down and listen.  I nod, and they seem unsure if they should continue to speak when I don't interrupt them immediately with questions.  I've stopped trying to have all the answers, but sometimes the questions still make my heart pound with anxiety.  I ask them anyway, my voice soft, the walls are thin, do you feel safe at home, where are these bruises from, how many partners in the last year, can you tell me how often you're shooting up, are you planning on becoming pregnant at this time, have you ever had symptoms like these before, how long have you had this pain?  I say, I'm so sorry that happened, that sounds really difficult, you don't need to apologize, ever, can you let your legs fall out just a bit more, you're in charge here, okay?, will you tell me if this hurts, let's use the other arm for this blood draw, let me know when you're ready.

I think back to a before time, when it felt important to do it all perfectly, to remember the order for collecting a Pap and how many centimeters into the cervix to insert the cytobrush in order to extract a sufficient sample, to perform a breast exam so flawlessly that no inch of tissue went unexamined by my probing fingers.  I think back to when I would recite my pelvic exam "lines" in my head on the drive to clinical, terrified of forgetting our textbook's directions for the best way to elicit cervical motion tenderness and what that would mean.  The words fall out of my mouth now, scoot all the way down, this is my hand on your leg, these are my fingers, this is the speculum, lots of pressure now, cervix looks good, little crampy now while I take a sample for the lab, you might have some spotting today, no need to worry, speculum coming out now, we're almost done, these are my fingers again, I'm going to press on your belly, any pain while I do this?, I'm making you have to pee, I know, okay, you are all set, you can scoot on back and up.

I know now that a sufficient sample and a smoothly performed exam do not erase the bruises on her inner thighs.  I know that my ability to rattle off the medication regimen for gonorrhea, chlamydia, pelvic inflammatory disease, and herpes does nothing for the woman whose trust has been shattered by a disease she did not give herself.  I hand her tissues and say, again, I'm so sorry.  I hope, maybe, that this tiny exam room with the fake wood paneling and the ancient posters on the walls can be something more than a bizarrely furnished box.  This tiny space we share where I ask them about their day, their dogs, their children, where I admire their socks and listen to what they say and even harder for what they do not say.  It is in this place I think, maybe, that in spite of all my weird and deeply probing questions, in spite of my hands inside them and my far from perfect technique, even in spite of all that I fumble and trip over and the answers I do not have, it is my hope that they feel safe.  That she sees that when the door shuts, I am with her and that is all that there is.  That I am long past the point of ever batting an eye no matter what she may ask or tell me, and that I will do my best to answer her questions but will tell her frankly if I cannot.  And maybe for five or ten insignificant minutes, maybe that is enough.

I've stopped trying to be right.  I only try to be kind.

Body Talk

I have become a person who exercises.  This would have been unthinkable to me a couple of years ago, when I was far past my days of varsity crew and smack in the middle of my days of eating so little that climbing stairs was a dizzying workout.  And then came the long hard slog of running semi-regularly for more than a year before it finally clicked with me that running, hiking, yoga, lifting, and - most recently - Crossfit, are not things I do to lose weight but rather are things I do because my body rocks and is strong and because they keep me sane and they keep me honest and they keep me eating.  And all of those things are so much more important than how badly I used to want to be a size 2 again.  Like, bad enough that it kept me awake at night.

So all that working out did make me lose about 15 pounds.  It feels good.  I had gained so much weight (about 40 pounds) so quickly when I started eating again back in the spring of 2012 that I couldn't fit into any of my clothes and felt enormous and awkward and like I would never in a million years be comfortable in my body, or, more distressingly, figure out how to eat normally and not like a caged animal.  And the first year of nursing school did not help all that much.  And then finally, this summer, it was like all the being patient and gritting my teeth and refusing to starve myself and refusing to stop running all started to pay off and it felt easier to work out and easier to eat normally and actually possible to make good food choices consistently and to push my plate away when I was full.  You know, skills most adults have mastered long before now.

That said, as it started to get easier to eat better (consistently, and normal amounts, and a pretty decent balance of vegetables, proteins, etc.) I started to pay more attention to what I was eating and how it made me feel.  It struck me that while it was easy to feel like I was eating better - not bingeing, purging, or starving - I still was eating more sugar, processed foods, and "treats" than I maybe thought I was.  I've also developed some skin issues that have stubbornly stuck around for more than a year now, despite frequent doctor visits and medication regimens.  And I get bloated, crampy, and gassy at least once or twice a week.  Lightning bolts probably shot out of my head when it occurred to me that that wasn't entirely normal, and that it was also almost certainly preventable.

So today marks the first day of my own Whole 30 experiment (I know I'm late to the party, don't worry).  I'm really curious to see if cutting out all of the junky stuff from my diet clears up my skin, helps me sleep better at night, and gives me more energy.  Full disclosure: I've been toying with the idea of doing this since July, and never quite got up the nerve.  Last night, lying in bed, R. told me his stomach felt gross from eating pizza that day.  I asked him if he wanted to try this elimination diet thingie with me, for kicks.  He whined a bit when I told him no sugar and then said sure and asked me when we started.  I said maybe November 1st, so we'd have time to prepare and plus, it just sounded like a nice day to start.  He laughed and said that was ridiculous, we're starting tomorrow.  Gulp.  So we did.  And then we went to Crossfit this morning and I almost died and threw up and vowed that for the next few months, the midwifery goal can take a back burner to my singular and all-consuming goal at this time - to not be the last person done with the workout, just once.

(Kidding, guys, I'm still in school and loving it.  More posts to follow soon about the fact that - holy sh*t - I'm seeing patients on my own now, and I get to call myself a "student midwife" rather than a "student nurse" and I whip out pelvic and breast exams like they're no big deal when even two months ago I was all OMG VAGINAS AND WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING.)

So!  Follow along on my clean eating adventure and I'll probably come here to complain more than once about not eating all of the things that make me feel yucky but just taste so darn good.

Long Days

I hear the whispers outside the room in which I'm sleeping.  They float through my subconscious even as my body pleads, No, no, no it's not time to wake up yet, please no.
"Mommy, can I wake Cakey up yet?"
"What time is it?"
"Almost 6."
"Okay, but be gentle."

Tap tap tap.  I feel her feather hand on my shoulder and crack my eyes open to see her smiling face.  "Hi, Sage," I whisper sleepily.  She grins and flings herself in for a hug while I try to pull myself upright.  She is so grown up in daylight hours, eloquent and mature, and achingly in between childhood and adolescence, but at 6 AM on Thursday mornings, she is my sweet warm buddy again, crawling into my lap and telling me in excited whispers about her school's hiking and overnight trip she's going on today and do I want oatmeal for breakfast and how was my clinical yesterday and should we wake up June so she can see me too?

Half an hour later, June is still not awake.  I sneak into her room, where she is splayed across her mattress, naked except for her wedgied pink underpants, blankets tangled about her feet.  I stroke her back softly, whisper, "Juney-Bee, wake up..."  She turns toward me blearily, her hair in her face.
"Mommy?" she asks.
"No, sweetie, it's Cakey."
"Cakey??!  Is it really you?"  Her sleepy eyes wide open now, she pushes her bangs away, sees it's really me and scrambles her hot little monkey body into my lap and wraps all four impossibly long limbs around my torso and squeezes till my eyes tear up.  She lays her head into my chest and sighs.  "I'm so happy you're here, Cakey.  I love you."
"I love you too, sweetness.  I'm so glad you're mine."

We eat oatmeal at the table and the chatter washes over me while I pour milk and slice apples and we talk about what to wear for school picture day and hiking trips and their mother, a former boss, and now a friend, smiles at me over their heads while I mouth, Thank you for all of this, and she only laughs and shakes her head and wraps me in another hug.

It's a long drive to Massachusetts every Wednesday afternoon for a clinical shift in a tiny community sexual health center whose two exam rooms are each big enough to touch all four walls while you stand in the middle.  I cram myself by the door while my midwife preceptor wedges herself behind the exam table and moves mountains for her patients and teaches them about birth control.  I leave with my face hurting from smiling and my stomach rumbling its emptiness.  I drive to the home of the only nanny family I still keep in touch with, where I bask in the light of being loved and needed and welcomed and family, even while I miss my own family so much it hurts.  I drive the two hours home, shower in a flurry, drive to work and prop my eyelids open for the rest of the day, momentarily panicking when I remember I have a midterm on Monday, a test on Tuesday, an assignment due Wednesday, and a mountain of work before clinical next week.

But today I got to wake up to my two favorite girls and for now that is more than enough.

Cake Fail

I follow a blog called The Bitten Word that does what I could only dream of doing - actually cooking the recipes from their monthly supply of food magazines.  Now, granted, the only food magazine I subscribe to is Cook's Illustrated, which comes every two months and definitely lends itself to well-intentioned stockpiling on the bookshelf with promises to myself of, "I will definitely make that someday."  Anyway, the folks at The Bitten Word issue a yearly challenge to help them cook every recipe out of the September issue of Bon Appetit.  I signed up this year, and was issued the task of making this: buttermilk cake with sour milk jam and gin-poached cherries (whew).

All my ingredients.

It was less than impressive.

It incorporated several elements of baking that I find vexing - like the need to go to Whole Foods for a strange and expensive ingredient (juniper berries?), the finished product requiring complex assembly, the use of three (3) separate complete elements, and a wholeheartedly unrealistic amount of time spent doing active work (not, say, cooling something on the counter or baking something in the oven).  So, not only was it a great deal of work, but it tasted gross.  This saddened me.  But!  (There's always a but.)  I had fun making something that I never would have made otherwise, and the cake part itself tasted delicious.

First, I planned.  I got most of the stuff I needed on a grocery run - in the process acquiring more dairy than our fridge has held in months: buttermilk, whole milk, and creme fraiche.  Then, I traded picking up a friend at her mechanic for a cup of leftover gin she had since I didn't want to buy a whole bottle.  (Meanwhile thinking to myself, isn't a cup of gin, like, a LOT of gin??).  Finally, I resigned myself to going to Whole Foods after class one day to buy a four-dollar jar of dried whole juniper berries.  I will be personally indebted to anyone who finds another recipe with which I can use any more of the (barely touched) bottle of juniper berries, by the way.

The cake part, like I said, was delicious and simple enough.  Just a yellow cake batter, using buttermilk, which gave it a lovely soft crumb and a delicately sweet flavor.  Scrumptious.

Then, I spent 45 minutes cooking down milk and sugar into a syrup of such sickening sweetness that even mixing it into 8 ounces of creme fraiche didn't make it not taste like a cavity.

Finally, I followed the recipe exactly and attempted to make a gin, sugar, juniper berry, and dried tart cherry syrup thing to also put with the cake.  Total fail.  There was nothing syrupy about it, and the cherries were macerated within minutes.  I took one taste after cooking it for at least twice the amount of time called for (in an attempt to reduce the vast volume of liquid) and it was like taking a shot of gin in a spoon.  I'm not in college anymore, so this made me gag.

The finished product.

I took one bite of it all together, threw the sour milk "jam" and the alcoholic cherries in the trash, said a silent apology to the friend whose gin I'd wasted, and ate a piece of the cake with my hands.  Whomp whomp.  I'm very curious to see what others who made this recipe thought of it!  And I was at least happy to note that my instincts when looking at this recipe (looks complicated, and, is that seriously going to taste good...?) were spot on.

Anyone else had some recent cooking adventures they'd like to share?

Summer's End

Summer has abruptly and unceremoniously come to an end.  On my run the other day, I realized with a start that my bright sneakers were shuffling through dry leaves and there was a hint of woodsmoke in the air.  Unequivocally, fall.  It's still 85 degrees during the days here sometimes, but the chill of the evenings and early mornings are insisting, nope, fall.  I love it.  I also hate fall, but as we've discussed, I'm a fan of strong things in opposition.

This guy built a web across our entire front porch.

Basking in his grandparents' love and attention.

Tomato chutney, freshly canned.

I miss this.

School has started again and it's a heady mix of Oh my good god, how can I possibly keep up with this insane workload? and Babies! Bellies! Fetal heart tones! Leopold's maneuvers! Holy jeebers, I can't believe we're actually learning all of this!

It feels both surreal and like the most natural thing in the world, all at the same time.