first call

Well, I did it. I survived my first night on call. We worked hard, but it wasn't crazy. Not quite as enjoyable as my resident nights on call (those nights I had a long supper break, and a coffee break), but not as tiring and crazy as well. When I finished (and between myself and my hubby, we cleaned the slate), I was able to go home and sleep in my own bed. What a treat! As a resident, the staff person would go home and we would stay. We would sleep in an uncomfortable little room with very thin walls dreading the time when our pagers would inevitably go off. Many a night I made money for my attending with IV starts, traumas, and epidurals, getting very little sleep. Last night, I did none of that. Sure, my pager could have gone off (it didn't), and I could have had to go in, but before I would have had to, I would have gotten a bit of good sleep in my bed. I wasn't even really tired today. Previously, the day after call (we just call it "post"), I would have been bagged the entire day and needing to go to bed by 7:30 pm. I feel like I could stay up to my usual time tonight and be just fine. This is so civilized!

Again, I am struck by what a wonderful husband I have. He was ready to help me out at any moment. I am sure that if something really awful had happened and I would have had to run back to the hospital, he would have been there for me. He even told me that he was proud of me last night! I knew I loved him for a reason!

As firsts go, and I still am having a lot of them, I am doing OK. I keep saying, "so far, so good!", and it truly is. Do I feel different as a staff? Yes, and no. Yes, because now I can go home after call and I am respsonsible and can make the decisions. No, because none of this is any different than anything I was doing before. It is like being married to someone you have been with and lived with for years (like Jurgen and me), it is different, but good different.