There were numerous days of PT school that I didn't know if I was going to make it. That might sound slightly dramatic but I actually mean it. If you don't believe me then you can either talk to any of my immediate family or talk to my roommate. All of those guys (plus numerous others) seriously deserve a gold medal for all of the support, love, and encouragement they gave me through the rough last two and a half years.
There was the first semester that I didn't know if I could pass our Kinesiology&Pathomechanics class, then there was the second semester I didn't know if I would make it through Neuro Anatomy, then the next fall I didn't know if I could stay in school with all of my health issues, and that following spring I didn't know if I could finish because I was just so tired of school. But guess what? Here I am- I made it! I graduated! I'm completely done with my DPT degree. CRAZY! God is so good. It is seriously nothing less than a miracle that I've made it here.
I think my parents got sick of all the texts and calls where I would say that I was quitting PT school. There were lots of ideas I threw out when I talked about quitting. One of them was going and working in a third world country at an orphanage because I felt so selfish devoting all of my time to schoolwork and not doing anything else for others. Another was just quitting and being a "full-time friend". My friends always gave me a hard time about the "full-time friend" idea because it obviously sounded completely ridiculous but I just really love being a friend. I love writing letters, I love celebrating birthdays and other special occassions, and all-in-all I just love being a friend. So the best thing about both of those ideas is that both of them are going to happen now and I didn't even have to drop out of grad school to make them happen!
The first is happening because I'm traveling to Kenya in February to volunteer as a PT for a month, both treating patients and also educating the Kenyan PT's on better treatment techniques. The second gets to happen everyday in my future profession. In the outpatient orthopedic setting I get to be "friends" with all of my patients as I work with them several times a week for multiple weeks.
It was kind of ironic because in the same period of time that I received my randomly assigned license plate of "BFF" (which makes me think of the middle school saying "Best Friends Forever") was the time when my clinical instructor told me "Our job is all about relationships. You really have to be friends with all your patients." The whole time he was saying that I was thinking "Is this real life? I get to be friends with all these people and get paid for it?!? That's a dream come true!" Okay, I know when it comes down to it working everyday as a PT won't be perfect but I still feel very blessed to be in a career that I get to combine my love for people and my passions for anatomy and exercise.
The crazy thing is that I've made it through school and I never thought I'd say this but it was ALL worth it. I have said it at least a 100 times since starting clinicals and hopefully I'll be saying it until the day I die. It was all definitely worth it.
All of the nights of cramming, all of the stress and anxiety,and all of the complaining and venting. Although all of those things weren't probably necessary all of the time but they happened. There were a lot of sacrifices I had to make through grad school. Lots of things I wanted to do and lots of people that I loved had to be put on the backburner in order to get the grades I needed in grad school. But if that's the cost I had to pay to be where I'm at now then it was worth it. Every test, every lab practical, every single part of grad school that I hated at the time, it was worth it.
I love PT.I love what I get to do on a daily basis.I know that I've only gotten to experience 7 months in the "real world" but after that short time in the clinic I am so excited for the career I have ahead of me. And I am fully aware that just like school, I will have both good and bad days at work, but overall I know that it will be great because I get to help people everyday for the rest of my life.
I am blessed to be where I am now and I can confidently say "It was ALL worth it."
Tuesday, December 24, 2013
Friday, December 13, 2013
Dare to Dream
I just finished the LAST day of clinical internships, the last day of being a PT student in the clinic, the last day of working for free...after over 40 weeks of it I'm ready to be done! I am very excited, however, it was sad to leave the clinic today for numerous reasons. First of all, I was leaving my dream PT position because I loved the clinic that I was at. Second, I was leaving the state that I had fallen in love with. Third, I was leaving my friends and family that I had gotten close with over the last 2 months. Fourth, I was leaving my patients that I had become rather attached to. (Couple quick patient stories: one patient started balling when I told her I was leaving and she gave me a long extended wet hug with all her tears falling on me and she didn't let go of me for over 3 minutes...LONGEST, MOST AWKWARD HUG EVER! Another elderly woman asked me where the ballot was that she could fill out to request that I stay longer at the clinic. Funniest part was that she was DROP DEAD SERIOUS! Several of my other patients asked if they had to keep coming to PT because they said "I feel like I'm doing a little better already and it just won't be the same at all without you".)
All of my patients asked me the same question of "What's next?" and my typical answer was "Well I'm going to Iowa to graduate and celebrate Christmas with my family and study for my boards exam and then I'll go to Kenya to work as a PT for a month. After that I hope to move back to Colorado to get a PT job."
All of the above is truth but tonight I'm focusing on the last sentence. I want to move out to Colorado. I want to get a job there. But here's the problem...I don't have a job yet and there don't seem to be many jobs available. It was so sad to say bye to the mountains today knowing that I might never live in Colorado again.
The one factor that keeps me at peace is knowing that I did everything I possibly could in order to get a job there. I was fortunate enough to work four-12 hour days so I had one week day off to network with PTs each week. Every week day off I would drive around to 1-3 clinics throughout an 1.5 hr radius and "job shadow" with the end goal being trying to meet as many PTs as possible and make a good impression so they could put a face to my resume. It is crazy the doors that God opened to me in Colorado. The amount of people that I met that introduced me to PTs or physicians in the Denver/Boulder/Fort Collins area was incredible. I literally could tell over 15 stories about how I got in contact with different clinics and met various PTs. The cool thing is that I got to visit almost all 15 of those clinics. I have NO IDEA if any jobs will come from those visits but I have complete confidence that I was supposed to spend all of that time commuting and job shadowing because God wanted me at all those clinics. All of the PT clinics said the same thing of "We are impressed by your resume. We don't have any positions open but we will let you know if any open up. You are definitely a great new grad applicant but we don't ever hire new grads."
At one of the clinics I visited they told me that they had received over 500 resumes for one PT position in Colorado. It reminds me kinda of PT school where there's a ridiculous amount of applicants but very few spots, however, it's even worse this time around because everyone is a licensed PT, most of them having way more years of experience than me. I know that I would have a lot better odds at getting a job anywhere else in the country, but here's the thing, that's not my dream right now. My dream is ADVENTURE. It's MOUNTAINS. It's COLORADO.
One of the many reasons being in Denver the last two months was awesome was because I got to hangout with my awesome cousin Amanda who is full of wisdom. We had several good conversations about what it looks like to dream with God. It got me starting to ask questions like "What's the difference between our dreams and what God's dreams are for us? Does God plant dreams in our hearts? What does it look like to dream with God?"
I don't know the answers to all those questions yet but I do know that God made us dreamers for a reason. God has given us dreams, some of them unfold and some of them don't. And just because some of them don't unfold doesn't mean that we shouldn't dream.
Right now my dream is getting a job in Colorado. I want to live there for a couple years and embrace every possible outdoor adventure there is the mountains. I want to climb the 14ers, mountain bike the Boulder trails, ski in every mountain town, white water raft down the rivers...etc. When I dream, I dream of working and living in Colorado. But with this dream I have to trust that if God wants it to happen then it will and if it doesn't then I have to have faith that he was way better dreams for me.
So what does it mean to dream with God? I think it means dreaming BIG.
What does it look like to dream with God? I think it means daring to write down your dreams. If you write them out it means they're real and they exist. If you write them out you're looking at them square in the face and admitting that you can't deny them anymore. I think it's good to write out both short and long-term dreams. For some those dreams might be to get a job in a certain location like it is for me. For others it might be to get married and have a family. I know that's mine eventually but in the short term it is to have ADVENTURE. And right now adventure looks like Colorado.
I'm dreaming BIG tonight. And I will continue to even if the chances look extremely slim that my dream will unfold. I'm going to strive for the impossible of getting a job in Colorado. If I fail then it's okay because it means God's got better dreams for me and I'm excited to see what those will be.
Go DREAM BIG tonight. I dare you.
Psalm 37:4
Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.
All of my patients asked me the same question of "What's next?" and my typical answer was "Well I'm going to Iowa to graduate and celebrate Christmas with my family and study for my boards exam and then I'll go to Kenya to work as a PT for a month. After that I hope to move back to Colorado to get a PT job."
All of the above is truth but tonight I'm focusing on the last sentence. I want to move out to Colorado. I want to get a job there. But here's the problem...I don't have a job yet and there don't seem to be many jobs available. It was so sad to say bye to the mountains today knowing that I might never live in Colorado again.
The one factor that keeps me at peace is knowing that I did everything I possibly could in order to get a job there. I was fortunate enough to work four-12 hour days so I had one week day off to network with PTs each week. Every week day off I would drive around to 1-3 clinics throughout an 1.5 hr radius and "job shadow" with the end goal being trying to meet as many PTs as possible and make a good impression so they could put a face to my resume. It is crazy the doors that God opened to me in Colorado. The amount of people that I met that introduced me to PTs or physicians in the Denver/Boulder/Fort Collins area was incredible. I literally could tell over 15 stories about how I got in contact with different clinics and met various PTs. The cool thing is that I got to visit almost all 15 of those clinics. I have NO IDEA if any jobs will come from those visits but I have complete confidence that I was supposed to spend all of that time commuting and job shadowing because God wanted me at all those clinics. All of the PT clinics said the same thing of "We are impressed by your resume. We don't have any positions open but we will let you know if any open up. You are definitely a great new grad applicant but we don't ever hire new grads."
At one of the clinics I visited they told me that they had received over 500 resumes for one PT position in Colorado. It reminds me kinda of PT school where there's a ridiculous amount of applicants but very few spots, however, it's even worse this time around because everyone is a licensed PT, most of them having way more years of experience than me. I know that I would have a lot better odds at getting a job anywhere else in the country, but here's the thing, that's not my dream right now. My dream is ADVENTURE. It's MOUNTAINS. It's COLORADO.
One of the many reasons being in Denver the last two months was awesome was because I got to hangout with my awesome cousin Amanda who is full of wisdom. We had several good conversations about what it looks like to dream with God. It got me starting to ask questions like "What's the difference between our dreams and what God's dreams are for us? Does God plant dreams in our hearts? What does it look like to dream with God?"
I don't know the answers to all those questions yet but I do know that God made us dreamers for a reason. God has given us dreams, some of them unfold and some of them don't. And just because some of them don't unfold doesn't mean that we shouldn't dream.
Right now my dream is getting a job in Colorado. I want to live there for a couple years and embrace every possible outdoor adventure there is the mountains. I want to climb the 14ers, mountain bike the Boulder trails, ski in every mountain town, white water raft down the rivers...etc. When I dream, I dream of working and living in Colorado. But with this dream I have to trust that if God wants it to happen then it will and if it doesn't then I have to have faith that he was way better dreams for me.
So what does it mean to dream with God? I think it means dreaming BIG.
What does it look like to dream with God? I think it means daring to write down your dreams. If you write them out it means they're real and they exist. If you write them out you're looking at them square in the face and admitting that you can't deny them anymore. I think it's good to write out both short and long-term dreams. For some those dreams might be to get a job in a certain location like it is for me. For others it might be to get married and have a family. I know that's mine eventually but in the short term it is to have ADVENTURE. And right now adventure looks like Colorado.
I'm dreaming BIG tonight. And I will continue to even if the chances look extremely slim that my dream will unfold. I'm going to strive for the impossible of getting a job in Colorado. If I fail then it's okay because it means God's got better dreams for me and I'm excited to see what those will be.
Go DREAM BIG tonight. I dare you.
Psalm 37:4
Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.
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