“Enjoy the journey. Don’t feel like your life is on pause while you’re in PA school. It’s easy to get overwhelmed and forget that you are on a journey. PA school is not just a goal; it is an experience. Even though the pathway changed, I never doubted I would end up in medicine.”
Everyone has their issues in life, and not everything is something you can control. Even in those situations, you can always try to put a spark of happiness in someone else’s day. After fourteen years here at UT, I’m continuing to try to do just that.
“It doesn’t matter which school you trained at previously, or whether your life experiences have prepared you; medical school is difficult for everybody. Everyone eventually gets through the journey at their own pace.”
I asked, “what does it look like? You’ve seen a hundred.” He warned me that it looked like cancer.
“We are a welcoming place where anybody who walks through our door is automatically our neighbor.”
I consider myself someone who never wants to let my team down. The transportation department taught me to be meticulous about getting the details right (if I didn’t, trucks didn’t go out on time and people simply didn’t get fed).
“Role models are key to where you go in life, and I’ve been very fortunate to have a lot of mentors and role models who have been very influential to me.”
“I’m not angry; I resent the fact that I’m unable to do many physical things that I used to, but I live what in my opinion is a blessed life. None of us are guaranteed the next day.”
“Inspiration can come from anywhere, even the most unexpected places; that 40-minute conversation certainly changed how I approach my own life and practice.”
“What you do for someone else matters in ways that you don’t know. Even if you think that you’ve failed to meet a need, and even if you objectively have, you don’t know how you might have made a difference. That affects my practice on the days when I feel like I don’t know anything.”
