Hello again! As I’m coming up on the 3rd birthday of this blog (and a fresh new year is looming), I wanted to re commit myself to MilitaryDoc.com. As you may have noticed my posts have been few and far between for the past year and to be frank it is because life is busy when you’re in residency. I constantly feel like I’m running out of time, spreading myself thin trying to study, exercise, socialize and be a responsible adult keeping my house clean, paying bills, etc. Because there are simply not enough hours in a day, this blog quickly got pushed down on the to-do list. But when I had the option of renewing my domain name this past month, I couldn’t just walk away. MilitaryDoc was something I poured my heart and soul into when I was in medical school and it opened several doors for me and creating an awesome network of fellow military physicians or pre-med hopefuls. Ultimately it was you who made me want to keep this blog alive and well.

This year has been a whirlwind. In my residency program the second year is one of the toughest due to most of the rotations being out of state (40 weeks of travel!) and this is the year I rotated through several surgical subspecialties. I went into 2020 thinking it would be difficult, but never did I imagine a world wide pandemic would get thrown into the mix. This is also the year that has taught me to be better doctor. I undoubtedly have taken care of some of the sickest patients I have ever met and I feel my knowledge and skill base is growing exponentially with each rotation.

As time keeps passing from when I was a medical student, going through the match and residency interviews, the focus of my blog will move away from these processes as I don’t want to be providing outdated information now that I am out of the loop. Instead I will continue to write about HPSP in general terms, being a military physician, and my life as a surgical resident and active duty service member.

I hope moving forward I can continue to use this platform as a way of helping and connecting with my fellow pre-med, medical student, and co-resident counterparts. Here’s wishing you a very happy holidays and I look forward to what 2021 has in store for us. – Kirsten