I'm cheating my way through dental school

Most wives have to endure four years of dental school, followed by an additional one to four years of a residency, after they already survived a few years of undergrad together, too. Good grief. Does the schooling ever end?

The road to becoming a DDS, DMD, MDS and the like can be rough, and seem never ending, right?

We're only in our third year, but already, it seems like graduation is light years away. That's probably why I didn't get married at 18, I need to live a little first, before I could even consider helping put a husband through school. Wise move on my part, if you ask me.

I've decided I totally beat the system, and took the fast track. The trick to getting through dental school faster than most is to marry your soon to be doctor after he's already completed a year or two of those brutal teeth pulling years, trapped behind bars in what they assure you is a dental school, not a prison. What should be four years magically become two or three. It's brilliant. Pure brilliance. 

Did you take the fast track? Or have you been in it for the long haul?

July Again

I cringe when I recall what it was like walking into our new house for the first time last July.

My baby and I had just arrived in Tennessee after a month long stay in Utah without B. The moving truck had been unloaded a week prior to our arrival and yet B. was so busy with his new residency he hadn't had time to unload a single box.

I knew I had my work cut out for me in the days ahead, but "Good grief," I remember thinking, "when he said I'd be in charge of unpacking, he really meant it."

Now here we are an entire year passed and everything is put away. Well, kind of. Some days it doesn't look like it. That's what having a toddler does to a home. Until he's in bed, nothing is ever put away for good.

Some nights I still go to bed and cringe because I'm just too dang tired to deal with the mess. Colored blocks strewn all over the front rooms, into the living room and even trailing into the kitchen. Magnets from the fridge that little man thinks belong on the floor, and oh look, there's an ant walking underneath the kitchen table because I haven't had time to clean up the mess he made at lunch yet.

Oh help me.

Because of the whole principle behind it, we will never ever be one of those families who hires a cleaning service--no matter how much money we have. But boy, some days I wish we could have one right now.

Three's a Crowd

Today B. worked his last day as a first year resident. Similarly, my brother-in-law (who was B.'s Chief Resident, have I mentioned that yet?) turned in his pager, keys, scrubs, etc., and walked out of the doors of UT for the last time (well, maybe he'll be back someday, but you know what I mean).

So while I celebrate B.'s accomplishment, I feel somewhat defeated seeing my in-laws moving on with their salary-making/career-booming lives, leaving us in the dust, and knowing we've still got a three year hill to climb. Three more when this first one was one of the slowest-passing of my life. Was it really only a year because it felt like five.

All I can do is remind myself that we are lucky. We have friends who didn't even match. We could have easily found ourselves in that situation last year. But we didn't. And here we are, one year down.

We can do it.

And tomorrow we leave for five days in Hilton Head. A graduation trip of sorts for the graduating Chief.

So, really, I shouldn't complain so much. Because we may have three long agonizing years ahead of us, but I'm sure whatever happens between now and then will be memorable and rewarding times. And maybe, just maybe when B. turns in his pager and walks out of the hospital for the last time there will be a trip to Hawaii at the end.

Because after this first year, he deserves it. (Okay, and so do I.)

As we go on, we remember . . .

One year ago today, B. graduated from dental school.

We spent the next three chaotic days packing up everything we owned into a 20-foot long U-haul and drove the six hours south to Tennessee so B. could start his residency.

Since it's once again graduation weekend, that means dental wives everywhere are crying tears of relief, tears of joy, tears of stress, tears of sadness, tears for the unknown, etc. And quite possibly all simultaneously.

Don't worry girls, it's going to be okay.

One year later, it kind of feels like it was all a dream. In fact, I just hung up the phone with my bff L. and we couldn't believe it has really been an entire year since the boys threw their hats into the air and officially became dentists.

It feels like just yesterday was my last night in Richmond and I was sitting on our outside walkway steps (because all our furniture was packed up and there was nowhere to sit indoors) saying goodbye to another dear friend. Just yesterday that I was on a weekend shopping trip with the girls. Just yesterday that I sat in my neighbors house with 20 other girls eating junk food and watching The Bachelor.

It definitely wasn't yesterday though because even though residency years have begun, I'm far away from anything resembling dental school days.

But as much as I sometimes wish I could rewind to those days, I know there is a time and place for everything.

I met a girl last year who, even though her own husband had long been graduated from dental school, still wasn't "over" her dental school years. In fact, she was still semi-obsessed with everything about it.

"Weird," I thought more than once during the course of our conversation.

Don't get me wrong. I enjoyed the dental school days. I probably wasn't as immersed in the whole experience as some of the girls, but I still cherished it. But just like high school there comes a time when you just have to get over it and move on.

Love the memories, but make new ones.

You follow?

So hopefully in three more years when B. finally graduates (again), I'll be able to look back with the same perspective and tell myself not to worry because it's going to be okay.

Forever Friends, Forever More (aka Dental School bffs)

Even before B. started dental school I'd heard rumors.

"Oh the friends you'll make!" exclaimed my sister-in-law, who although younger than me, wisely married someone four years older and thus was wrapping up her "dental school experience" just as I was starting mine. When they moved out of their little townhouse after graduation day, we moved in (a monumental mistake worth explaining another day).

"You won't ever want to leave and your last Sunday there you will cry and cry!" she continued.

But my first Sunday in my new ward I was skeptical.

See, I didn't consider myself the "typical" dental school wife. By the time I met B. and married, most girls my age were marriage veterans and had at least two or three kids under their belt.

Needless to say, as I looked around in Relief Society that Sunday all I saw were girls who looked younger but had far more "experience" and confidence in those matters than I did. It was intimidating in a way I'd never known before and I found my normally confident self becoming slightly insecure. Instead of introducing myself and going out of my way, I found myself crouching up in a little anti-social shell and doubting that any of these girls would want to be friends with me. Afterall, we had next to nothing in common.

As the oh so long days, weeks, and months of that first year passed, I was so paranoid that I wouldn't fit in that I started to believe it. As you can guess, with B. hunkered down studying like mad, it was a very lonely first year for me.

It wasn't until the start of the second year that I met my fellow dental wife bff L. We instantly became best buds. Although I could have easily brushed her off as another one of those "younger" girls, we were in the same boat and she was impossible not to love. We had both been independent career-women before we met our husbands, had both married guys already in dental school (who also happened to be former roommates), and we had similar interests, etc.

She was heaven-sent, I am sure of it. I would not have survived those remaining dental school years without her.

Fast foward to graduation day. I did cry, as my sister-in-law predicted. But only once. And not because I was sad to be leaving and couldn't bare to part with all my lifelong friends (tears=moving/house selling drama).

But if I learned one lesson during those years, it was this: it doesn't matter if you're 21, 26, or 30. Every one can be a potential friend, even if it appears on the surface that you have absolutely nothing in common.

So, in a sense, yes, the rumors are true.

What I Wish I Would Have Known (Part I)

My dental school ward was made up of some super stylish and stupendous looking women. Every Sunday I felt like we needed to roll out the red carpet for the weekly fashion show.

If it was in style, you can bet every girl had one in each color. The heels, the bags, the ruffle tees, the flower and feather head bands. You name it, they had it and they made sure to show it off on Sunday.

I'm no fashionista, but I can't say even I didn't get caught up in it from time to time. I mean, we were surrounded by clothing outlets in all directions and a major metropolis just up the freeway. Plus, a lot of these girls came straight from Utah/BYU-land and well, enough said.

And then B. started his residency and we moved to Tennessee.

The bubble burst.

All I could think was "Whoa. What just happened?"

It was like moving from Hollywood to the backwoods of Hickville. Dresses worn with tennis shoes isn't considered a fashion faux pas here. In fact, no dress at all is also quite common. I'm no longer shocked to see women wearing pants to church.

The bottom line is the women in my new ward simply do not care one iota about being fashionably acceptable. It's not in their realm of priorities.

I have to admit, it was a major shock to my system at first. I wouldn't be surprised if the ladies here don't even know what J-crew is. But that's okay.

Because what was so foreign to me when we first arrived in Tennessee has actually become quite refreshing. The aisles of church are no longer a fashion runway. It feels awesome to be able to concentrate on spiritual matters rather than other, ahem, matters of a more worldly nature. Really awesome.

So instead of trying to keep up with the Joneses, just remember to be yourself. I'm not saying wearing jeans to church is the best idea, and I'm certainly not condoning the whole tennis shoe/dress combo.

But it's okay not to be the queen fashion bee wherever your world is, whether that be Hollywood or Hickville.

Dental School 101 (for the wives, not the students)

We searched sporadically for weeks, if not months, to find a website out there that catered to LDS dental student wives. Was there a site that offered advice on how to survive those four crazy years (or three, if you're lucky)? A site that allowed other wives to share their experiences? A site that could tie the whole experience into one big facetious nutshell?

We found nothing.

And so we begin.

Our hope is that this blog can provide an outlet for other LDS student wives to share their talents, their creativity, and their advice and tips for making it through those crazy years called dental school--or residency, for those poor (quite literally) souls whose husbands decided to continue on with the journey.

Enjoy!