It’s been a great summer, but we’re also looking forward to getting back into the school routine. This was my first summer off since my second year of medical school.
For almost twenty years, my summers were spent in medical school, residency, fellowship, studying for and taking my boards, interviewing for jobs, or working. Medicine and motherhood were intertwined from the very beginning. My water broke while I was in the operating room with my first baby, and he was born just two hours later. My maternity leave after that was only eight weeks, and my leave with my second wasn’t much longer. There was always somewhere I needed to be or something I needed to accomplish.
I don’t think I realized what I had missed until this summer. For the first time, I could just be their mom. I wasn’t always watching the clock, wondering when I needed to leave for work or when I’d finally make it home after another long day at the surgery center. I could give them my full attention.
I even got a few one-on-one days with each of them. Without all the distractions, I got to really see the little people they’ve become: their personalities, their sense of humor, their growing independence, and the confidence that’s starting to shine through.
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We filled our days with little adventures and a few bigger ones. We hiked through Alaska to watch salmon jumping upstream, climbed treetop adventure courses, stayed up far too late for a baseball game and drone show with Grandma and Pops (without Mom and Dad), ran summer races, and celebrated milestones that felt enormous to them, like touching the bottom of the deep end, learning a reverse layup, and starting our first weight-lifting workouts (Luke and me).
And maybe one of the biggest lessons of all, learning that it’s OK to be bored.
This summer off wasn’t something I chose. It came because of a diagnosis that changed the course of my career. But looking back, it gave me something I didn’t even know I needed.
As physician mothers, we spend so much of our lives taking care of other people’s families. As an anesthesiologist, I had the privilege of caring for children and adults during some of the most vulnerable moments of their lives. I found so much purpose in my work, and I took that responsibility seriously. But it also came with immense pressure and days that pushed me to my limits. Stepping away gave me the perspective to see how often my own children sometimes got what was left of me after I had spent the day taking care of everyone else.
I don’t say that with guilt. It’s simply something I couldn’t see until life forced me to slow down.
This summer reminded me that childhood keeps moving, whether we notice it or not. There will always be another responsibility, another deadline, another reason to say, “Maybe next time.”
I’m grateful for this summer.
Loryn Kromrey is an anesthesiologist.
