The Interview Trail

Around the middle of their 4th year, med students go on what is called the interview trail. They go literally around the country interviewing for residency programs. Lyle started on his and since I need a job too wherever he matches, I went along interviewing for post doctoral positions. This process took us on a three week tour of the southwest and was the reason for such a gap in blog posts.
We headed out late the Saturday after Thanksgiving (hoping the kids would sleep all the way) to my parents house in AR where we set up camp. The kids would stay with my parents while we traveled to different cities for interviews.




Our first stop was Memphis, TN. This is a picture of us before going to dinner with the residents and other applicants the night before the interview.



This is Lyle the morning of his first interview. I thought he looked great..very professional!
My interview was later that day at St. Jude Research Hospital. We both had really nice interviews.



We left Memphis on Tuesday and headed to St. Louis for Lyle's interview at Wash U. St. Louis is a great city and we have great friends there...could be a good place for us!

We got home from St. Louis on Sunday and were able to play with the kids for a couple days before heading to Nashville for interviews at Vanderbilt on Wednesday. Nashville was very cool. We stayed in the Marriot hotel at Vanderbilt which was close enough to the medical center for us to walk back and forth...although it was very cold and neither one of us had packed for cold weather!

On Saturday, we made the trip back to AR to see the kids (and give my parents some relief) until we left out again on Monday for Little Rock. Again we both had nice visits but the traveling and the stress of answering a million questions were starting to get to us. We were both tired. Only two interviews left to go!

On Wednesday, Lyle headed out for his Tulsa interview solo. I decided to stay with my mom and help out with the kids. Taking care of a 3 yr old and a 11 month old is hard for anyone. Then Friday morning (Dec. 18th), we packed up all the kids and headed back to Big D. Lyle had his Southwestern interview Friday night and all day Saturday. We were glad to be home...for a while...Christmas was right around the corner and we were due back in AR on the 23rd!

We don't find out until March 18th were Lyle will match and were we will be moving but all in all, it was an interesting process. We are looking forward to the next phase of our lives...Lyle-residency, me-post doc, Ella-kindergarten, Luke-pre-school. Should be fun!!