CHAPTER 13
After the whirlwind of third-year rotations, we were given a twoweek break.
I spent the first week holed up in my apartment,
catching up on sleep. After that, I went back to Wisconsin for a few days,
visiting friends and family. Mick crossed my mind often, but I had finally
moved on—not with another guy, but with the quiet confidence that I
was on my own path.
One night, Erin and I went out for drinks. After regaling me with her
Match.com horror stories, she asked if I was interested in anyone.
I shook my head.
“Really? No McDreamys or McSteamys?”
“Trust me,” I said with a laugh. “It’s nothing like Grey’s Anatomy.”
“What about life outside the hospital? New York City has to be
crawling with hot guys.”
“Sadly, other than dinner dates with Lesli, I don’t have much of a
personal life.” I hesitated, then said, “Is Mick seeing anyone?”
“I don’t think so,” she said. “But I doubt he’d tell me if he was.”
“Why wouldn’t he?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s like an unspoken rule that we don’t
talk about you.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Seriously?”
She nodded. “I don’t think he can bear to hear your name. He’s not
over you.”
My stomach fluttered for a reason I couldn’t quite name.
—
Back in New York, our fourth year was gearing up. It was time to start
studying for Step 2 CK (Clinical Knowledge)—the next gatekeeper to
residency. Between filling out applications and hitting up attendings for
letters of recommendation, interview season was also in full swing. Lesli
and I practiced questions with one another—Why Ob-Gyn? Why this
program? Where do you see yourself in ten years? By the time oncampus
interviews began, we were ready.
One morning, speaking with an older attending from Wake Forest
School of Medicine, I deviated from my usual, polished answer.
Instead, I told the truth: “I like sitting with patients in the hardest
moments of their lives. I like not looking away.”
Her pen stilled. She met my eyes and nodded.
—
In January, the subinternship lottery opened for spring rotations. I
submitted two preferences—Ob-Gyn and Internal Medicine—then began
planning electives I hoped would shape my future: maternal-fetal
medicine, gynecologic oncology, and reproductive endocrinology and
infertility (REI).
In February, I finalized my Rank Order List for the Match. I included
fourteen places, putting Columbia first and UW Health last.
Less than three weeks later, it was finally Match Day. We gathered in
a lecture hall where we were each handed an envelope. Inside was the
single piece of paper that would dictate where we’d spend the next three
to seven years of our lives, depending on the specialty.
Lesli wanted to open our envelopes together, but I needed to be alone.
I found an empty stairwell and sat on the cold steps. My hands shook so
much I had to steady them on my lap.
I finally opened it and read: Columbia University Medical Center
—Ob-Gyn Residency Program.
It was my first choice.
For a moment, I just stared.
A rush of joy followed.
There was a tiny beat where Mick crossed my mind, the ultimate
what-if floating through me like vapor.
Then, something steadier rose to the surface. Not happiness exactly—
but certainty. Certainty that wasn’t based on a man, or a friendship, or
some inner desire to achieve, but instead welled up from something deep
inside me.
I stood up and walked back into the lecture hall, letting myself
believe in a future that I’d carved entirely on my own.
CHAPTER 14
Miraculously, Lesli had matched at Columbia, too, so after
graduation, we both traded our student IDs for badges that read
resident physician. Being an intern carried pride but also enormous
responsibility. At the bottom of the residency hierarchy, we were
punching bags for everyone above us. Attendings barked orders, senior
residents expected perfection, and every misstep was magnified. The
stakes were so much higher—our decisions carried real consequences,
both medically and legally. Fatigue became constant—measured in
skipped meals, trembling hands, and the constant fear of getting
something wrong.
Still, there were plenty of small victories along the way: my attending
praising me for catching a subtle arrhythmia on an EKG that everyone
else had missed; successfully threading a central line under pressure in
the ICU; calmly taking command of a team when a patient went into
sudden hypotensive shock.
Each of these moments affirmed what I could already feel: I wasn’t
just surviving intern year—I was excelling under fire.
It was also the year Lesli and I befriended Greer, a fellow intern,
from Harvard Medical School. Greer was the yin to our yang, breathing
fresh air into our duo. Somehow, she always looked rested, even postcall, showing up in Chanel and full makeup while Lesli and I looked like
greasy ghosts. Greer insisted that we have lives outside the hospital.
Having grown up in Manhattan, she introduced us to the glamorous side
of the city, booking theater tickets, Sunday brunches, and downtown
dinners.
Somewhere along the way, I followed Lesli’s advice and “got under”
a few men. I even fell for one of them—an older photographer named
Leo—but we broke things off when he decided to move to London.
There was no way I’d ever do long distance again.
—
By the third year of my residency, my impostor syndrome had mostly
faded. By then, I was running my own continuity clinic, following the
same patients over time, and scrubbing into complex gyn surgeries:
fibroid removals, hysteroscopies, and laparoscopic endometriosis cases.
But patient interaction was still at the heart of what I loved—helping
people create families and offering hope where there had only been
heartbreak.
That spring, I decided to apply to fellowships in Reproductive
Endocrinology and Infertility. Lesli was on the fence about her
subspecialty, but one night over dinner, I floated my idea. “Join me in
REI, and one day we can open our own clinic.”
“Well, that’s intriguing,” she said, her eyes lighting up.
“We could enlist Greer, too,” I said.
Lesli smiled. “She could fund the start-up.”
“She sure could.” I grinned.